NASA is working toward a goal of landing another person on the moon by 2024 and for “sustainable lunar exploration” by the middle to end of the decade.
It’s part of the Artemis plan, which also calls for sending astronauts to Mars.
It’s in this context that the University of Arizona got a $500,000 grant from NASA to work on new ways to mine for materials on the moon using robots.
Moe Momayez is helping to lead that effort; he’s an associate professor and the interim head of the Department of Mining and Geological Engineering at the University of Arizona.
The Show spoke with him to learn why there needs to be new techniques to mine on the moon, relative to how we do it here on Earth.
