Miscellaneous

[Airicist]

Real world: testing NASA's new Moon robot

Uploaded on Dec 8, 2008

In this NASA eClips video segment learn about the mobile robot NASA plans to use for future missions to Mars: the All-Terrain Hex-Limbed Extra-Terrestrial Explorer, or Athlete. Athlete is a six-legged, wheeled, mobile robot that will be used to move the astronauts habitat as well as serve many other purposes for the mission. NASA is currently testing Athlete on Earth using the mathematics concept, scaling and ratios. Learn how NASA is able to test a model of Athlete, which is only 1/3 the size of the actual mobile robot!

[Airicist]

Lunar Persistence Apparatus
from Robb Godshaw
August 13, 2014

The Lunar Persistence Apparatus is a robotic sculpture consisting of a teleprojector and a computerized motor assembly that strives to project a duplicate of the Moon in the precise direction of the Moon forever.

Using GPS and a digital compass, the Lunar Persistence Apparatus ascertains its latitude, longitude, altitude, and heading, as well as the current universal time. It then references a table of lunar positions and phases and adjusts its phase mechanism and its dual motors as it attempts to align itself with moonbeams, casting its own light into the infinite abyss of space.

During the day, The apparatus continues to indicate the lunar position even when the moon is underfoot. Walls and even the ground become suddenly transparent— but only to Moonbeams.

Materials: GPS Receiver, Digital Compass, Angular Accelerometer, Quartz universal time clock, Computer, Moon slide, Light blocking foil, 18 Watt LED, Mylar film, Motors, Steel, Aluminum, Various optics.

[Airicist]

Destination: Moon

Published on Jan 19, 2015

This 8-minute film gives an overview of the past, present, and future of Moon exploration, from the Lunar cataclysm to ESA’s vision of what Lunar exploration could be.

Why is the Moon important for science? What resources does the Moon have? Is there water? Why should we go back and how will we do it?

[Airicist]

NASA | A view from the other side

Published on Feb 4, 2015

A number of people who've seen NASA's annual lunar phase and libration videos have asked what the other side of the Moon looks like, the side that can't be seen from the Earth. This video answers that question. The imagery was created using Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter data.

[Airicist]

"In the Shadow of the Moon", documentary, David Sington, Christopher Riley, 2007, United Kingdom

Published on Nov 24, 2015

Between 1968 and 1972, the world watched in awe each time an American spacecraft voyaged to the Moon. Only 12 men walked upon its surface and they remain the only human beings to have stood on another world.

Uploaded under license from DRG.

"In the Shadow of the Moon" on Wikipedia

"In the Shadow of the Moon" on IMDb

[Airicist]

America’s first Lunar Surveyor: 50 years later

Published on Jun 2, 2016

Surveyor 1 landed on the lunar surface on June 2, 1966. It was America's first spacecraft to make a powered soft landing on the moon and the robotic precursor to the Apollo astronaut missions to come.

[Airicist]

The past and future of lunar exploration

Published on Jan 19, 2019

Al Worden, Command Module Pilot for the Apollo 15 mission talks about the US space programme during the space race and the future of lunar exploration.

Colonel Worden is one of only 24 people to have flown to the Moon, and he is best known as the first astronaut to make a spacewalk in deep space, during the return of his Apollo flight from the Moon in 1971.

In an interview recorded at the Technik Museum Speyer, Germany, Al Worden describes his mission as the first truly scientific flight in the Apollo programme.

[Airicist]

Lunar Exploration – ESA's missions

Published on Jan 20, 2019

50 years after the first human landed on the Moon, what is next? The exploration of our Moon is a global endeavour with Europeans and commercial actors playing a large role. The European Space Agency has developed an exploration programme based on four main missions.

Luna Resurs is a partnership with the Russian agency Roscosmos that will carry European technology to land precisely and safely on the Moon (PILOT) and to extract and analyse samples of the lunar terrain (PROSPECT).

Orion and the European Service Module will return humans to the Moon and take advantage of the new technology for human space transportation. Orion, the NASA spacecraft, will bring humans farther than they have never been before. ESA is providing the service modules that will provide propulsion, life support, power, air and water, and control the temperature in the crew module.

ISRU aims to extract and process resources on the Moon into useful products and services: “In-situ resource utilisation”. A mission to explore lunar resources could be a reality from 2025. The goal is to produce drinkable water or breathable oxygen on the Moon.

The Heracles mission could take of in 2028 to allow us to gain knowledge on human-robotic interaction while landing a spacecraft on the Moon, collecting samples with a rover operated from the lunar Gateway and send samples back to Earth.

[Airicist]

Preparing for a lunar spacewalk

Published on Jan 24, 2019

Developing the safest and most efficient way to return to the Moon starts on Earth. European astronauts and spacewalk experts are preparing for the future of Moon exploration with electronic aids, upgraded geological tools from the Apollo era and improved scientific protocols.

In November, ESA conducted a moonwalk simulation in Lanzarote, Spain as part of Pangaea-X, a test campaign that brought together space exploration, high-tech survey equipment and geology.
Wearing a bulky spacesuit in an alien environment is one of the constraints humans will have to deal with on the Moon. The new operational concepts and equipment prototypes being tested take into account the limited movement these spacesuits allow.
Communication between the scientists and astronauts is also a key part in enhancing the efficiency of future expeditions to the Moon. The scientists at ground control used an innovative tool called the Electronic Field Book that shows all relevant data in one place and includes voice chat. The communications tool is an all-in-one, easy-to-use and plug-and-play device.

These Pangaea-X dry-runs are testing the waters for future exploration with a space gateway, from which a lunar spacewalk coordinator could guide astronauts on the Moon in cooperation with a planetary geologist in mission control on Earth.

[Airicist]

Go forward to the Moon

Published on Mar 11, 2019

NASA is going to the Moon and on to Mars, in a measured, sustainable way. Working with U.S. companies and international partners, NASA will push the boundaries of human exploration forward to the Moon. NASA is working to establish a permanent human presence on the Moon within the next decade to uncover new scientific discoveries and lay the foundation for private companies to build a lunar economy.

Right now, NASA is taking steps to begin this next era of exploration.