The NASA Ames clinic team, at the request of the research center’s Exobiology Branch, has designed and built a sample loading and manipulation system, or SLMS, for the CHEMIN instrument, a compact combined X-ray diffraction and X-ray fluorescence device bound for Mars. The project’s objectives include the design and manufacture of the SLMS, an X-ray-tight housing, and an X-ray beam-defining aperture system.