As a 10 year old girl, Laurie Leshin saw the Viking Lander images of the martian surface and wanted to touch the rocks. As we approach the 30th anniversary of the Viking landings, she is one of the lucky few scientists who get to study rocks from Mars in labs here on Earth. In this talk, she will discuss the Martian meteorites, the few dozen Martian samples we have on Earth. How do we know they’re from Mars? What do they teach us about water and the possibility for life on the Red Planet? She’ll discuss the future exploration of Mars, including critical instruments and mission concepts being pursued at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center. We will also hear about the experiences of that 10 year old girl as she grew up to be a leading planetary scientist who now, as Director of Sciences and Exploration at Goddard, heads the largest science organization within NASA. In that capacity, she has responsibility for ensuring the scientific integrity of Earth observing missions, astrophysical observatories such as the James Webb Space Telescope, and instruments exploring the Moon, Mercury, Mars, Saturn, comets and more. These missions seek to answer some of the most fundamental questions we can ask: How did we get here? What is our destiny? Are we alone?