lunar surface
Scientists may have spotted the long-lost Soviet Union Lander - 60 YEARS after it vanished from the surface of the moon
Woke ESPN star claims she felt'ill' sitting near JD Vance while watching Winter Olympics Nancy Guthrie note sender says they're'ready to name names' in exchange for cash and doesn't trust police: Live updates I knew Kurt Cobain and that vindictive moron Courtney... the truth about his'murder' is more twisted than you realize. Amazing new side-effect of nicotine - it can help you eat less, live longer and even sharpen your brain. Disturbing new surveillance camera details that could explain how Nancy Guthrie's abductor fled without a trace as flip-flopping sheriff makes another evidence confession Read the disturbing emails between Epstein and new age guru Deepak Chopra that are buried in bombshell files: 'Only sinners invited'... 'Bring your girls' Melania Trump's favorite lipsticks revealed... and the eyeshadows she can't live without Pancreatic cancer explosion: As cases surge in young people, survivors reveal subtle early signs that are easily dismissed... and doctors share lifestyle tweaks that help PREVENT it Distraught family ordered to remove HEADSTONE atop two young brothers' graves that features very inappropriate images HGTV star was canned after vile video leak... now insiders make bombshell claims about what else she was doing behind the scenes: 'Unhinged' Israeli hostage reveals how she survived being tortured and sexually assaulted'almost every single day' during 482 days in Gaza - with only the thought of her kidnapped boyfriend keeping her going Lindsey Vonn's surgeon speaks out amid amputation fears to reveal star's'delicate' situation after horror Winter Olympics crash Pam Bondi is caught SPYING on lawmakers reviewing Epstein files'torture video' Can you name all three nepo babies in this photo taken during New York fashion week? Pretty Denver suburb descends into vagrant-filled hellhole... with lawmakers dismissing residents concerns by telling them that'homelessness is a complex issue' Iconic 80s heartthrob who starred with Sean Penn in coming-of-age classic is seen at 69... who is he? Scientists may have spotted a long-lost Soviet Union Lander, more than 60 years after it vanished on the surface of the moon.
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Wireless power grids head to the moon
Private companies are testing new power systems for longer rover missions and future human lunar habitats. Breakthroughs, discoveries, and DIY tips sent every weekday. A future lunar lander bound for the dark side of the moon will carry along a piece of equipment that could make these missions a little bit brighter. The lander in question is operated by Firefly Aerospace, the first commercial company to successfully land and operate spacecraft on the moon. A LightPort wireless power receiver will be mounted atop the Firefly Blue Ghost lander's upper deck.Developed by Canadian aerospace startup Volta Space Technologies, the cargo plays a key role in Volta's ultimate goal: establishing a network of satellites that can wirelessly beam solar power to spacecraft on the lunar surface.
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Optimizing Earth-Moon Transfer and Cislunar Navigation: Integrating Low-Energy Trajectories, AI Techniques and GNSS-R Technologies
Muhammad, Arsalan, Ahmed, Wasiu Akande, Ojonugwa, Omada Friday, Biswas, Paul Puspendu
The rapid growth of cislunar activities, including lunar landings, the Lunar Gateway, and in-space refueling stations, requires advances in cost-efficient trajectory design and reliable integration of navigation and remote sensing. Traditional Earth-Moon transfers suffer from rigid launch windows and high propellant demands, while Earth-based GNSS systems provide little to no coverage beyond geostationary orbit. This limits autonomy and environmental awareness in cislunar space. This review compares four major transfer strategies by evaluating velocity requirements, flight durations, and fuel efficiency, and by identifying their suitability for both crewed and robotic missions. The emerging role of artificial intelligence and machine learning is highlighted: convolutional neural networks support automated crater recognition and digital terrain model generation, while deep reinforcement learning enables adaptive trajectory refinement during descent and landing to reduce risk and decision latency. The study also examines how GNSS-Reflectometry and advanced Positioning, Navigation, and Timing architectures can extend navigation capabilities beyond current limits. GNSS-R can act as a bistatic radar for mapping lunar ice, soil properties, and surface topography, while PNT systems support autonomous rendezvous, Lagrange point station-keeping, and coordinated satellite swarm operations. Combining these developments establishes a scalable framework for sustainable cislunar exploration and long-term human and robotic presence.
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Meet the history-making Nasa astronauts headed for the Moon next year
The commander of Nasa's next mission to the Moon said that he and his crew would see things that no human has ever seen. Reid Wiseman told a news conference that it was likely that his spacecraft would fly over large areas of the Moon that previous Apollo missions had never mapped. Yesterday, Nasa announced it hoped it would be able to launch the first crewed Moon mission in 50 years as early as February 2026 . Mission specialist Christina Koch explained that the astronauts would be able to study the lunar surface in exquisite detail for a full three hours. Believe it or not, human eyes are one of the best scientific instruments that we have, she said.
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3D-printed houses, Prada spacesuits and laser-cut football pitches: What life on the moon will REALLY look like - as scientists discover a secret cave under the lunar surface
Plans to put a human colony on the moon took a promising step forward this week as scientists in Italy revealed they've found the first lunar cave. It could be a site for a lunar base, as it offers shelter from'the harsh surface environment' and could support long-term human exploration of the moon. It comes as NASA continues with its ambition to set up its'Artemis Base Camp' in the lunar south region within the decade – but what could this look like? MailOnline spoke to experts to find out how the first settlers could set up camp on our lunar satellite and what sort of facilities it may have. Moondwellers could live and sleep in 3D-printed houses, or eventually play football on laser-cut pitches in their Prada spacesuits.
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A Machine Learning Approach to Detecting Albedo Anomalies on the Lunar Surface
Strukova, Sofia, Gleyzer, Sergei, Peplowski, Patrick, Terry, Jason P.
This study introduces a data-driven approach using machine learning (ML) techniques to explore and predict albedo anomalies on the Moon's surface. The research leverages diverse planetary datasets, including high-spatial-resolution albedo maps and element maps (LPFe, LPK, LPTh, LPTi) derived from laser and gamma-ray measurements. The primary objective is to identify relationships between chemical elements and albedo, thereby expanding our understanding of planetary surfaces and offering predictive capabilities for areas with incomplete datasets. To bridge the gap in resolution between the albedo and element maps, we employ Gaussian blurring techniques, including an innovative adaptive Gaussian blur. Our methodology culminates in the deployment of an Extreme Gradient Boosting Regression Model, optimized to predict full albedo based on elemental composition. Furthermore, we present an interactive analytical tool to visualize prediction errors, delineating their spatial and chemical characteristics. The findings not only pave the way for a more comprehensive understanding of the Moon's surface but also provide a framework for similar studies on other celestial bodies.
LuSNAR:A Lunar Segmentation, Navigation and Reconstruction Dataset based on Muti-sensor for Autonomous Exploration
Liu, Jiayi, Zhang, Qianyu, Wan, Xue, Zhang, Shengyang, Tian, Yaolin, Han, Haodong, Zhao, Yutao, Liu, Baichuan, Zhao, Zeyuan, Luo, Xubo
With the complexity of lunar exploration missions, the moon needs to have a higher level of autonomy. Environmental perception and navigation algorithms are the foundation for lunar rovers to achieve autonomous exploration. The development and verification of algorithms require highly reliable data support. Most of the existing lunar datasets are targeted at a single task, lacking diverse scenes and high-precision ground truth labels. To address this issue, we propose a multi-task, multi-scene, and multi-label lunar benchmark dataset LuSNAR. This dataset can be used for comprehensive evaluation of autonomous perception and navigation systems, including high-resolution stereo image pairs, panoramic semantic labels, dense depth maps, LiDAR point clouds, and the position of rover. In order to provide richer scene data, we built 9 lunar simulation scenes based on Unreal Engine. Each scene is divided according to topographic relief and the density of objects. To verify the usability of the dataset, we evaluated and analyzed the algorithms of semantic segmentation, 3D reconstruction, and autonomous navigation. The experiment results prove that the dataset proposed in this paper can be used for ground verification of tasks such as autonomous environment perception and navigation, and provides a lunar benchmark dataset for testing the accessibility of algorithm metrics. We make LuSNAR publicly available at: https://github.com/autumn999999/LuSNAR-dataset.
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NASA wants to build a train on the MOON for when humans eventually live there
If the idea of building a train on the moon sounds like something from the pages of a sci-fi novel, you wouldn't be alone. But the moon train is actually just one of six'science fiction-like concepts' to receive new funding from NASA's Innovative Advanced Concepts program. Flexible Levitation on a Track, or FLOAT, plans to use levitating magnetic robots to transport up to 100 tonnes of materials on the lunar surface every day. According to the team behind the Scalextric-like project, this would provide a reliable and autonomous way of moving resources mined on the moon. Project leader Dr Ethan Schaler, a robotics engineer at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, says: 'A durable, long-life robotic transport system will be critical to the daily operations of a sustainable lunar base in the 2030's'.
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China launches lunar probe to take samples from far side of the moon
Former National Security Adviser Robert O'Brien joins'Life, Liberty & Levin' to discuss the Biden administration's foreign policy in the Middle East. China on Friday launched a lunar probe to land on the far side of the moon and return with samples that could provide insights into differences between the less-explored region and the better-known near side. It is the latest advance in China's increasingly sophisticated space exploration program, which is now competing with the U.S., still the leader in space. China also has a three-member crew on its own orbiting space station and aims to put astronauts on the moon by 2030. Three Chinese lunar probe missions are planned over the next four years.
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A New Era of Moon Exploration Is Upon Us
On February 22nd, a robotic lander named Odysseus touched down on the sun-washed highlands near the south pole of the moon. It was the first time since the Apollo 17 mission, fifty-two years ago, that an American spacecraft had gracefully landed on the lunar surface. And yet NASA hadn't designed or built Odysseus; it was renting space onboard. Intuitive Machines, a relatively small aerospace firm based in Houston, was responsible for the lander, which launched atop a SpaceX rocket. The event was historic not just because it signalled a return to the moon but because it was the first time that a private company from any country had landed a spacecraft there.
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