Sending human remains to the moon with the first commercial lunar lander, Peregrine 1, on January 8, 2024, along with scientific instruments, caused controversy. Buu Nygren, president of the Navajo Nation, objected, saying that “the moon occupies a sacred place” in Navajo and other tribal traditions and should not be defiled in this way. The … Read more
Sign up for CNN’s Wonder Theory science newsletter. Explore the universe with news about fascinating discoveries, scientific developments and more. For thousands of years, the moon inspired people from afar, but the bright beacon in Earth’s night sky – more than 200,000 miles (321,868 kilometers) away – remained out of reach. That all changed on … Read more
Sign up for CNN’s Wonder Theory science newsletter. Explore the universe with news about fascinating discoveries, scientific developments and more. For thousands of years, the moon inspired people from afar, but the bright beacon in Earth’s night sky – more than 200,000 miles (321,868 kilometers) away – remained out of reach. That all changed on … Read more
For better or worse, the moon is officially open for business. On Monday (Jan. 8), United Launch Alliance’s shiny new Vulcan Centaur rocket will launch from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida carrying Astrobotic’s Peregrine lunar lander and the Celestis and Elysium commemorative payloads of human remains and DNA. Two memorial companies, Elysium Space and … Read more
The year 2023 proved to be a big year for space missions, with NASA’s OSIRIS-REx mission returning a sample of an asteroid and India’s Chandrayaan-3 mission exploring the moon’s south pole, and 2024 will be another exciting year for space exploration. Several new missions under NASA’s Artemis plan and the Commercial Lunar Payload Services initiative … Read more
The year 2023 turned out to be a big year for lunar science. India’s Chandrayaan-3 spacecraft landed near the moon’s south pole, a huge achievement for a country relatively new to space travel, especially after the Chandrayaan-2 spacecraft crashed in 2019. At the same time, NASA is preparing for a large number of moon-related missions, … Read more