The Moon, Mars and Beyond: The Next Era of Space Exploration

Why return to the Moon

Six crewed landings took place on the Moon between 1969 and 1972. Interest in going back is now growing again, this time with the aim of staying longer, learning more and preparing for journeys further out.

The Moon is a scientific treasure chest. Its surface has changed little over immense stretches of time, so its rocks hold a record of the early Solar System. Some of the most exciting places are near the poles, where deep craters stay in permanent shadow and appear to hold water ice.

That ice could be turned into drinking water, oxygen to breathe and even rocket propellant. The Moon is also close, about 384,400 km away, so a radio message arrives in only about 1.3 seconds. That makes it a sensible place to practise living and working beyond Earth before longer journeys.

Living and working on the Moon

A lunar base would need the same basics as any home: shelter, power, air, water and a way to stay in touch with Earth. Engineers are exploring habitats partly covered with lunar soil to protect people from radiation and big swings in temperature.

Power is one of the biggest questions. Some spots near the poles get sunlight for long stretches, which makes them attractive places for solar panels, and researchers are also studying ways to store energy through the long lunar night.

Using local materials could make bases far more practical. Researchers are testing ways to turn lunar soil into bricks, roads and landing pads, and to extract oxygen and water from the ground. Every kilogram that does not need to be launched from Earth makes the next step easier.

Robotic explorers on Mars and the long journey for people

Mars has been studied by orbiters that map it from above, landers that examine the ground and rovers that drive across its plains and crater floors. They have found strong signs that water once flowed there, in ancient river channels, lake beds and minerals that form in water.

Sending people is a much bigger step. Depending on where the two planets are in their orbits, Mars is between about 55 million km and about 400 million km from Earth, and the journey would take months each way. Crews would need to carry or make almost everything they use, and to stay healthy over a long trip far from home.

Distance also changes how people talk. Radio messages travel at about 300,000 km per second, yet still take about 3 to 22 minutes one way to reach Mars, so rovers, and any future crews, need to make many decisions on their own, often with help from on-board AI. The space signal delay calculator shows delays for the Moon, Mars and beyond, and a blog post on delegating decisions to AI far from Earth explores what that means for trust.

Asteroids and comets: time capsules from the early Solar System

Asteroids and comets are leftovers from the time the planets formed. Many have changed very little since, which makes them time capsules for understanding how the Solar System came together and where Earth's water may have come from.

Robotic spacecraft have already brought small asteroid samples back to Earth for study in laboratories. Others have flown alongside comets to watch them release gas and dust as they warm up near the Sun.

Scientists have also tested whether a spacecraft can gently nudge a small asteroid onto a slightly different path. Experiments like this reveal what asteroids are made of and how their orbits respond, knowledge that could prove useful long into the future.

The outer planets and their icy moons

Beyond the asteroid belt lie the giant planets: Jupiter and Saturn, made mostly of gas, and the ice giants Uranus and Neptune further out. They are so distant that light takes about 33 to 54 minutes to travel between Earth and Jupiter, and about 67 to 92 minutes to reach Saturn.

Some of the most intriguing places out there are moons rather than planets. Several moons of Jupiter and Saturn appear to hide oceans of liquid water beneath thick shells of ice, and one small moon of Saturn sprays jets of water vapour and ice grains into space from cracks near its south pole.

Where there is liquid water, energy and the right chemistry, scientists naturally ask whether life could exist. Nobody knows the answer yet, and that open question inspires designs for robotic explorers to study these ocean worlds more closely.

Telescopes looking deeper

Not all exploration means travelling. Telescopes in space, above the blurring effect of the atmosphere, can see fainter and further than ever. Because light takes time to travel, looking further away also means looking further back in time.

One of the great discoveries of recent decades is that planets around other stars, called exoplanets, are common. Astronomers spot many of them through the tiny dip in a star's light as a planet passes in front of it. Telescopes could increasingly study the air of some of these worlds, looking for water vapour and other gases.

A shared, international effort

Modern space exploration is increasingly a shared project. Many countries, universities, research institutes and private companies contribute instruments, spacecraft and expertise, and a single spacecraft often carries equipment built by teams on several continents.

The International Space Station, about 400 km up and continuously crewed since November 2000, shows what long-term partnership can achieve: people from many countries living and working together in orbit. Future exploration may build on the same spirit. Lower-cost access to orbit, helped by reusable rockets, means more partners can take part than ever before.

What space exploration could mean for builders and long-term investors

Exploration depends on supporting infrastructure, and that is where many founders are focusing their ideas, from communications and power to transport and services on and around the Moon.

These are long-horizon projects with technical uncertainty and costly hardware, so patient capital and partnerships between public bodies and private companies tend to matter. Long-term investors often look at how mature a technology is, which the technology readiness level explorer explains, and at who the future customers might be.

The space economy explorer maps how these pieces fit together. All of this is an educational picture of possibilities, and timelines in exploration are often long.

• Communications: relays that could keep crews and robots in touch, including on the far side of the Moon.
• Power: solar arrays, energy storage and systems designed to keep running through the long lunar night.
• Transport: landers, rovers and cargo deliveries between Earth, lunar orbit and the surface.
• Services: mapping, navigation, data and support for researchers working on and around the Moon.

Nicole Junkermann's perspective

Nicole Junkermann follows space exploration with the same curiosity she brings to artificial intelligence and health. She tends to ask how long journeys change the way people think, since projects that take years to plan reward patience, careful design and trust between partners.

In her view, exploration is a powerful reminder of long horizons and of why people should stay at the centre of progress. As her website puts it, "Progress only matters if it is human led and human shaped." Robots and AI can go first and do remarkable work far from Earth, while people set the questions and keep the final judgement.

For a lighter way into the same curiosity, the weight and age on other planets tool shows what you would weigh on the Moon and your age in Mars years, each lasting 687 Earth days. Her wider outlook is set out in her perspective on investing in space.