Lunar

It’s hard to think of a more challenging environment for an automotive battery than the Moon, and preparations for NASA’s Artemis program give us a chance to contrast the pioneering technology of the 1970s with where we are 50 years later.

Honeybee Robotics has outlined a plan to build a kind of power grid on the Moon, with a network of Statue of Liberty-sized towers containing solar panels and batteries that provide power and communications, and even act as streetlights.

When you live on the Moon, your only option for commuting back to Earth or on to Mars will be some kind of rocket. But each launch will kick up a hellstorm of debris. Building walls to contain the mess could be a perfect job for autonomous rovers.

Scientists have developed what could be a much quicker and easier technique for astronauts to make building-construction bricks out of lunar soil. The secret lies in heating that moon dust, then sticking it in an aerospace-grade microwave oven.

A somewhat scorched Chang'e-6 return craft landed in Inner Mongolia yesterday, bringing with it the first rock and dust samples from the far side of the Moon – and hopes of unlocking some lunar secrets.

China's uncrewed Chang'e-6 has successfully landed on the far side of the Moon, where it will gather lunar rock and soil samples from the unexplored region for the first time in history. On-board cameras caught the moment it touched down.

After an initial disappointment, Jeff Bezos is back in the Moon business. NASA selected Blue Origin's Blue Moon crewed lander for the space agency's Artemis V mission to the lunar South Pole in 2029 under a firm-fixed price contract of (US)$3.4 billion.

Water on the Moon isn't kept in convenient reservoirs, it’s locked away in the lunar soil. Now, a team of scientists has found that thirsty astronauts could one day refresh themselves fairly easily – by throwing a cup of Moon dirt in the microwave.

Looking back at data from the geology experiments left on the lunar surface by the Apollo missions half a century ago, scientists have finally determined that the Moon has a solid core surrounded by a fluid outer core similar to the Earth's.

It seems China's Chang'E-5 robotic Moon mission has discovered more than water on the lunar surface. Scientists have confirmed the discovery of a new mineral, a transparent crystal named Changesite-(Y), as well as a promising potential fusion fuel.

The Moon isn’t the most hospitable place, but that’s not stopping NASA from sending humans back there soon. Thankfully, an orbiter has now found a region of the Moon with year-round jeans-and-jacket weather – underground caves.

Researchers studying precious lunar samples retrieved by a Chinese lander have found them to be the youngest rocks ever found on the Moon, drastically reshaping the timeline of volcanic activity on our only natural satellite.