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NASA is planning to put US astronauts back on the surface of the <keyword id="42440" type="General" weightage="100" keywordseo="moon" source="Orion">Moon</keyword> by the end of 2024. This mission is just the beginning of what is shaping up to be a historic few decades in space exploration, as both the US and China have plans to establish a permanent human presence on the Moon. The first question you might have is: Why now? The short answer is the relatively recent discovery of water on the Moon. But the deeper and perhaps more important questions have to do with how competing space agencies will pull off this feat given the limited resources on <keyword id="6359982" type="General" weightage="50" keywordseo="earth" source="Orion">Earth</keyword>'s satellite. In this episode of The Conversation Weekly, we speak with two people - a planetary scientist who studies the geology of the Moon, and a space lawyer who studies space policy and geopolitics - about the challenges facing nations as humanity looks to set up shop on the Moon. When Apollo astronauts brought back the first lunar rocks in the late 1960s and early 1970s, scientists were disappointed to find no sign of water or anything of much use in the samples. The Moon looked to be a barren place. Fast forward a few decades and two coinciding events reshaped the future of the Moon - the sudden boom in the private space sector and the discovery of water frozen in permanently shadowed craters on the Moon's surface. All of a sudden, setting up a base on the Moon was not only desirable but feasible, too. "If you want to explore space with humans, water becomes one of the most critical commodities," explains <keyword id="1586509" type="General" weightage="50" keywordseo="mahesh-anand" source="Orion">Mahesh Anand</keyword>, a professor of planetary science and exploration at the Open University in the UK "We need water to survive, but water can also be split into its individual components, like oxygen, which we need to breathe." But there are many other resources on the Moon, and as Anand explains, "Water is where the story begins, but it doesn't end there. Utilizing resources in situ - where you are - that's what is actually opening up the field of lunar exploration." The US Artemis program, which had its first launch in 2022, is the beginning of a plan to eventually build a base on the surface of the Moon as well as a space station in orbit around it. The US and its collaborators are not alone in these lunar ambitions - China, too, has plans to establish a permanent presence on the Moon before 2030. And both groups explicitly plan to use lunar resources to accomplish these goals. How this all works legally is an open question that is being debated right now in international venues like the United Nations, but there are some agreements on the books already. "It's fun to think about space as being the Wild West with no rules. But it's not. We do have the Outer Space Treaty," explains <keyword id="16928181" type="General" weightage="50" keywordseo="michelle-hanlon" source="Orion">Michelle Hanlon</keyword>, a law professor at the University of Mississippi in the US This treaty has been signed by most countries and lays out an almost utopian framework for how nations are supposed to act in space. "The main provisions of the Outer Space Treaty say that space is for everybody," Hanlon continues. "Nobody can claim any territory in space, it's free for exploration and use by all, and the Moon and all of the celestial bodies shall be used exclusively for peaceful purposes." The high-minded ideals of space law are quickly heading toward a collision with the reality of humanity expanding off Earth - and bringing all of our geopolitics and competing interests with us. Listen to the full episode to learn how nations are navigating the big scientific, legal and moral questions of a lunar future. SEE ALSO: <a target="_blank" class="c-link c-message_attachment__title_link" href="https://www.businessinsider.in/business/corporates/news/these-indian-origin-ceos-running-global-giants-check-out-the-list/slidelist/98961480.cms">Neal Mohan, Kalpesh Parmar &amp; other Indian-origin CEOs heading global companies</a> <a target="_blank" class="c-link c-message_attachment__title_link" href="https://www.businessinsider.in/business/news/msmes-on-a-growth-path-with-rise-in-credit-demand-fall-in-delinquency-rates/articleshow/98961227.cms">MSMEs on a growth path with rise in credit demand, fall in delinquency rates: CIBIL-SIDBI report</a>

Back to the Moon: Space lawyer & planetary scientist tells us what it takes to share the benefits of lunar exploration

<ul class="summary-list"><li>Researchers say glass beads found on the moon's surface could contain billions of tons of water.</li><li>Their findings may help provide a method for humans to harvest water on the moon in the future.</li></ul>Glass beads on the moon's surface may contain nearly 300 billion tons of water, which could provide a way for astronauts on future lunar missions to get water in space, a team of 28 scientists says. Prior research in the last decades <a href="https://moon.nasa.gov/inside-and-out/water-on-the-moon/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">has shown that there is water on the moon</a>. But a new study <a href="https://affiliate.insider.com?h=0639f37e397020632db683887368e166a092351164c44b92b60ff63a0816fa58&amp;postID=6422501da5f1ba190b1c3d58&amp;site=bi&amp;u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.nature.com%2Farticles%2Fs41561-023-01159-6" target="_blank" rel="noopener">published on Monday in the Nature Geoscience journal</a> gives insight into how humans might be able to find and harvest that water.All smaller than a millimeter, 150 glass beads brought back to Earth were studied by a team of researchers from several Chinese institutions, including the Chinese Academy of Sciences. Two researchers at UK institutions were credited for the research as well.The grains were collected in 2020 during <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/chinas-change-5-spacecraft-landed-with-moon-rocks-2020-12" target="_blank" rel="noopener">China's Chang'e-5 lunar mission.</a>Extracting the water from these glass particles was relatively simple. All it took was heating them to 212 degrees Fahrenheit and above, said Mahesh Anand, one of the researchers on the team, <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/science/2023/mar/27/glass-beads-on-moon-surface-hold-billions-of-tonnes-of-water-scientists-say" target="_blank" rel="noopener">per The Guardian.</a>"This is going to open up new avenues which many of us have been thinking about. If you can extract the water and concentrate it in significant quantities, it's up to you how you utilize it," said Anand, a professor of planetary science and exploration at the Open University, per The Guardian.The scientists say the water was created from <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/second-giant-coronal-hole-sun-solar-winds-space-weather-aurora-2023-3" target="_blank" rel="noopener">solar winds</a>, which blow hydrogen — one of the two elements in water — onto the lunar surface. There, the hydrogen combines with oxygen from rocks on the moon to form water, which is stored inside the beads.Such a process means the beads can be refilled with water as solar winds continue to blow over the moon, the study said.The glass beads themselves form when small meteorites hit the surface of the moon and melt with material on the surface, per the study.It's important to keep in mind that the particles studied by the scientists were each made of less than 0.2% water, Sen Hu, one of the study's laboratory researchers at the Chinese Academy of Sciences, told Insider in an email.Still, with these beads making up around 3 to 5% of the lunar soil collected, the scientists estimate that there could be up to 297 billion tons of water in these particles.Hu said the water extracted from the glass beads shows promise that it could be used in future lunar missions.Hejiu Hui, a Nanjing University researcher credited in the study, <a href="https://edition.cnn.com/2023/03/27/world/water-moon-lunar-sample-chang-e-5-scn/index.html" target="_blank" rel="noopener">told CNN</a> that these findings are a step toward finding resources that could someday be used for drinking water, or even rocket fuel."This is one of the most exciting discoveries we've made," Anand told The Guardian. "With this finding, the potential for exploring the moon in a sustainable manner is higher than it's ever been."This discovery comes as the European Space Agency considers if it would be viable to <a href="https://www.esa.int/Science_Exploration/Human_and_Robotic_Exploration/Imagining_a_Moon_base" target="_blank" rel="noopener">establish permanent bases on the moon.</a> One such project is a <a href="https://www.esa.int/Education/Teach_with_the_Moon/ESA_Euronews_Moon_Village" target="_blank" rel="noopener">"Moon village"</a> that would be crewed and open to member states, similar to how the International Space Station operates.NASA also <a href="https://www.nasa.gov/feature/artemis-iii" target="_blank" rel="noopener">plans to once again send astronauts to the Moon in 2025,</a> 50 years after man last set foot on the lunar surface.China is also working toward putting its own man on the moon, <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2022/12/12/science/china-space-moon-mars.html#:~:text=The%20effort%20to%20develop%20reusable,not%20happen%20later%20than%202030." target="_blank" rel="noopener">pledging to complete such a mission by 2030.</a>

The moon could have up to 297 billion tons of water stored in tiny glass beads on its surface, scientists say

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Back to the Moon: Space lawyer & planetary scientist tells us what it takes to share the benefits of lunar exploration

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The moon could have up to 297 billion tons of water stored in tiny glass beads on its surface, scientists say

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