The goal of NASA Redirect Mission is to send a robotic spacecraft to a large near-earth asteroid and then collect a multi-ton boulder from its surface.[12] The astronauts would take samples of the boulder and bring them back to Earth for further scientific study, and finally they will redirect it into orbit around the moon so that it would not hit the Earth.[13] In addition, the interaction with the asteroids would provide much helpful data regarding the internal structure of the asteroid and therefore solve long-lasting questions about asteroids’ material. This mission integrates robotic and crewed spacecraft operations and, if successful, would demonstrate key capabilities necessary for NASA's journey to Mars.[13] However, White House Space Policy Directive 1 canceled the mission on Dec. 11, 2017 to accommodate increasing development costs.[13] Yet, many major progress in development for this mission, such as solar electric propulsion, detection and characterization of small near-earth asteroids, and the capability to capture large non-cooperative objects in deep space, will continue to be used in the future because they are indispensable to human deep space explorations.[13]