First successful demonstration for the robots of the future Lunar Village
The European Space Agency plans to organize a mission in 2025 to show the feasibility of using lunar resources. The exploration can only be carried out by robots capable of cooperating. A first simulation has just been successfully carried out.
Among the robots in development at the European Space Agency (ESA), those capable of cooperating will play a key role in future space exploration missions, including missions to Mars.
Announced in 2015 by former European Space Agency (ESA) Director Jan Wörner, the Moon Village, a utopian vision of a human and/or robotic lunar base, is now taking shape. ESA plans to launch the first In Situ Resource Utilization (ISRU) demonstration mission to the Moon in 2025. At the beginning of April 2021, the robotic platform in charge of this mission has just proven itself in an analog environment.
Robots to prepare lunar outposts
To stay on the Moon, humans will need resources: water, oxygen and building materials to make their habitat. However, it would be too costly to transport these raw materials from Earth by spacecraft; it is therefore preferable to use the resources present on site (in situ). Only robots can exploit these resources before the arrival of humans. Oxygen extracted from lunar…
