A replica of the moon has been built near Cologne, Germany. The European Space Agency (ESA) and the German Aerospace Center (DLR) have jointly developed an installation called “Luna Analog”.
ESA Director General Joseph Ashbacher said during a press briefing that the facility is designed to simulate conditions on the lunar surface and prepare astronauts to go to the moon.
Non-European astronauts are also trained at the facility, including astronauts from the US space agency NASA.
The installation, called Luna, is a “regolith test bed,” made of synthetic materials. It is an exact replica of the surface of the moon. There are all facilities for various training courses before going on any moon mission.
The Luna concept was first floated in 2013, but the original proposal for the 1,000-square-meter facility was narrowed down to a final design of 700 square meters.
According to Jürgen Schultz, a Luna engineer at the European Space Agency, ‘the Luna installation contains about 900 tons of regolith simulating material, which closely simulates the dusty environment and mobility found on the lunar surface.’
The dust for the artificial moon, called EAC-1, was obtained from 45-million-year-old volcanic powder found in the Eifel region, bordering Belgium, Germany and Luxembourg.
The model’s main hall surface also includes a special light simulator to recreate the day and night cycle.
ESA is also working with European partners to introduce gravity offloading systems.
Jürgen Schultz says that in addition to providing a realistic surface for astronauts to prepare for a Moon mission, the facility will also provide a test bed for operating robotic systems, scientific activities and energy systems.
For example, researchers at the facility will test regolith to understand the effects of moon dust on instruments brought to the moon by space agencies.
According to Ashbacher, the research at the facility aims to find solutions that ‘make life on Earth more productive and cleaner’.
Luna is not the only facility that will be available to astronauts and scientists. The Future Lunar Exploration Habitat (FlexHab) under construction will be a model attached to Luna’s main hall, which will help make habitation on the Moon possible.
One such Eden-ISS greenhouse, a five-year experiment that simulates growing food in the cold space environment, will be built as the “Eden Luna” project.
It will be used for trainee astronauts to practice growing their own food, a major step forward in NASA’s goal of a permanent presence on the Moon for research purposes.
NASA’s Artemis program is slated for a new moon mission by the end of this decade.
Artemis I was launched as an unmanned test flight in 2022. Under the second mission, a manned mission will go into lunar orbit, while a related third mission will take astronauts to the surface of the moon.
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2024-10-08 09:54:13
