Surface mineralogy of Earth-like planets, moons, and small bodies

Within the past 40 years, advances in ground-based remote sensing and significant return of spectral and compositional data from the orbit of a number of terrestrial and outer planetary bodies have led to a rapidly increasing knowledge of the surface mineralogy of solid objects in our Solar System. These results, combined with progress made in the fields of laboratory measurements and simulations, have allowed for better-constrained interpretation of planetary surface materials, with a particular emphasis on Earth-like planets and moons. The wealth and quality of returned data has permitted numerous comparative mineralogy investigations, hence allowing for comparisons of the evolution processes of the considered planetary objects. It is expected from future missions to bring back a substantial amount of additional compositional data, therefore enlarging the spectrum of already covered solid surface targets of our Solar System. To validate this data, advances shall be made in the area of analytical methods for gathering and analysing planetary samples.