NASA's next trip to the moon will entail 37 separate launches over a decade and culminate in the construction of a moon base by 2028, according to leaked documents that detail the agency's'Artemis' plan. Information on the nascent mission come from documents obtained by Ars Technica, and, for the first time, show a detailed glimpse of America's first human-led mission to the moon since 1972. In a graphic, NASA breaks down a year-by-year guide of the construction of the'Gateway' a space station and waypoint on the way to the moon, human test flights, and a lunar landing slated for 2024. Russia and the United States are cooperating on a NASA-led project to build the first lunar space station, codenamed the Lunar Gateway. The agreement, signed in September 2017, is part of a long-term project to send humans to Mars.

Russia is developing a moon base which will be operated with remote-controlled avatars, according to the country's space boss. Dmitry Rogozin, head of Roscosmos, has laid out plans to put robotic avatars on our natural satellite and have them operated by people on Earth. He claimed this endeavour is more ambitious than the iconic US'Apollo' programme of the '60s and '70s. 'This is about creating a long-term base, naturally, not habitable, but visited. But basically, it is the transition to robotic systems, to avatars that will solve tasks on the Moon surface,' Mr Rogozin said.