As an Amazon Associate we earn from qualifying purchases.

moon

NASA Plans to Land First Person of Color & First Woman on the Moon by 2024

by
Artemis Program - Amazon

NASA will land the first person of color in addition to the first woman on the moon with the Artemis program, NASA’s Acting Administrator Steve Jurczyk revealed today (April 9). Today, President Joe Biden’s administration submitted a budget proposal outlining its priorities for discretionary spending for the fiscal year 2022 to Congress. The proposed budget includes a funding increase that will support Mars sample return, research, climate science and more at NASA. Jurczyk responded to the news in a NASA statement and additionally revealed that the agency will be landing the first person of color on the moon with the … Read more

How Long Would It Take to Walk Around the Moon?

by
Moon Landing - Deposit Photos

From our vantage point on Earth, the moon looks small. But if you were to hop in a spaceship, don a spacesuit and go on an epic lunar hike, how long would it take to walk all the way around it? The answer depends on myriad factors, including how fast you can go, how much time every day you spend walking, and what detours you’ll need to take to avoid dangerous topography. Such a trip around the moon could take longer than a year, but in reality, there are a lot more challenges to overcome. A total of 12 humans … Read more

Lava tubes in Hawaii could be a dress rehearsal for Lunar/Martian colonies

by
Thurston Lava Tube - Deposit Photos

When humans build the first bases and habitats on other worlds, they’ll confront dangers and challenges unlike any faced by the astronauts who went before them. To prepare for such challenges, scientists are descending deep underground into lava tubes in Hawaii that simulate conditions on rocky alien worlds. There, mission crew members navigate uneven volcanic terrain and endure the physical constraints of performing research in a hostile environment. Wearing bulky suits like those required for extraterrestrial exploration, the scientists study the geology and organisms found in lava tunnels and caverns at Hawaii’s Mauna Loa volcano. This unique research station at … Read more

Is There a Protoplanet Inside the Earth?

by
planet collision - pixabay

A protoplanet slammed into the Earth about 4.5 billion years ago, knocking loose a chunk of rock that would later become the moon. Now, scientists say that remnants of that protoplanet can still be found, lodged deep inside Earth, Science Magazine reported. If remains of the protoplanet, known as Theia, did stick around after the impact, that may explain why two continent-size blobs of hot rock now lie in the Earth’s mantle, one beneath Africa and the other under the Pacific Ocean. These massive blobs would stand about 100 times taller than Mount Everest, were they ever hauled up to … Read more

SPACE: China and Russia to Establish Moon Base

by
moon base - deposit photos

China and Russia want to build a shared moon base. The two countries agreed to the plans on Tuesday (March 9), saying the International Lunar Research Station (ILRS) would be “open to all interested countries and international partners.” The “memorandum of understanding” between the two countries, announced by the China National Space Administration (CNSA), described the ILRS as a “comprehensive scientific experiment base with the capability of long-term autonomous operation, built on the lunar surface and/or on the lunar orbit that will carry out multi-disciplinary and multi-objective scientific research activities such as the lunar exploration and utilization, lunar-based observation, basic … Read more

The Moon is (Extra) Full of Craters

by
moon

The moon has many more craters than we thought, a new study finds. More than 109,000 new craters were discovered in the low- and mid-latitude regions of the moon using artificial intelligence (AI) that was fed data collected by Chinese lunar orbiters. The number of craters recorded on the moon’s surface is now more than a dozen times larger than it was before. The findings were published Dec. 22 in the journal Nature Communications. “It is the largest lunar crater database with automatic extraction for the mid- and low-latitude regions of the moon,” study lead author Chen Yang, an associate … Read more

SPACE: Did Mars Steal Our Second Moon?

by
asteroid - pixabay

An asteroid trailing after Mars could actually be the stolen twin of our moon. The asteroid in question, called (101429) 1998 VF31, is part of a group of trojan asteroids sharing the orbit of Mars. Trojans are celestial bodies that fall into gravitationally balanced regions of space in the vicinity of other planets, located 60 degrees in front of and behind the planet. Most of the trojan asteroids we know about share Jupiter’s orbit, but other planets have them too, including Mars and Earth too. Full Story From Live Science

SPACE: Water on the Moon

by
moon - pixabay

For the first time ever, scientists have identified water on the moon’s sunlit surface. They also found that water is more common on the moon than previously thought, with pockets of ice hiding in shadowy regions of “eternal darkness,” some as small as a penny, new studies reveal. Scientists have been finding signs of water on the moon since 2009 and, in 2018, confirmed the presence of water ice on the lunar surface. Now, researchers in two new studies have detected water at one of the largest crater formations on a sunlit surface on the moon and also found that … Read more

SPACE: Many Countries Refusing to Sign Moon Exploration Agreement

by
moon base - deposit photos

Eight countries have signed the Artemis Accords, a set of guidelines surrounding the Artemis Program for crewed exploration of the moon. The United Kingdom, Italy, Australia, Canada, Japan, Luxembourg, the United Arab Emirates and the US are now all participants in the project, which aims to return humans to the moon by 2024 and establish a crewed lunar base by 2030. This may sound like progress. Nations have for a number of years struggled with the issue of how to govern a human settlement on the moon and deal with the management of any resources. But a number of key … Read more

Apollo Moon Landing Films Restored With AI Help

by
Apollo Moon Landing - NASA/DutchSteamMachine

Astronauts on NASA’s Apollo missions to the moon captured astounding movies of the lunar surface, but recent enhancements with artificial intelligence (AI) have really made the films out of this world.  In remastered movies shared online by by DutchSteamMachine, a YouTube channel run by a film restoration specialist in the Netherlands, details from lunar scenes are astonishingly crisp and vivid; from mission commander Neil Armstrong’s first steps on the moon in 1969 to bumpy lunar rover drives during Apollo 15 and 16 in 1971 and 1972, respectively. The film restorer behind DutchSteamMachine, who also goes by “Niels,” used AI to stabilize shaky footage and generate new … Read more