Nasa mission to map Mars interior will launch this weekend

The InSight lander will make contact on the Martian equator and dig deep down into the planet to examine its inner core

Nasa's latest mission to another planet is set to blast off on Saturday on a seven month voyage across the frigid depths of space to Mars, with the aim of mapping the planet's interior for the first time.

The InSight mission aims to drop a lander the size of a garden table on to Elysium Planitia, a broad, flat and largely rockless lava plain on the Martian equator, from where it will become the first robotic probe to survey the centre of the red planet.