NASA's lunar-exploration program known as Artemis  aims to bring human explorers back to the Moon -- specifically, the unexplored south pole region -- by 2024.

Once on the Moon, Artemis astronauts will be tasked with finding water and other essential resources for long-term exploration. The teams will learn how to live on its surface and demonstrate technologies that will support an eventual mission to Mars.

The engineering testing ground of the Moon will help NASA understand the effects of long-duration spaceflight on humans, along with other important exploration tasks like habitat building and technology demonstrations.

NASA’s powerful new rocket, the Space Launch System  (SLS), will send astronauts aboard the Orion  spacecraft to lunar orbit. Astronauts will dock Orion at an orbital outpost known as the Gateway  and transfer to a human landing system for expeditions to the surface of the Moon.

In a live Tech Briefs-led presentation titled Artemis: Back to the Moon, readers had the following questions for Nujoud Fahoum Merancy, Chief of the Exploration Mission Planning Office at NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston.

Read Merancy's responses, and share questions and comments of your own at the bottom of each article.

Topics:
Aeronautics Aerospace Power Transmission Propulsion

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    Transcript

    00:00:01 we are going the history of this agency is marked with broken barriers once viewed as impossible with science fiction turned reality with innovations that have spun industries all their own and with demonstrations of peace for all humankind

    00:00:29 we soar in the skies of our home planet we maintain a human presence just outside of gravity and we touch points all across the solar system and beyond we're going back to the moon and this is why the moon is a treasure trove of science it holds opportunities for us to make discoveries about our home planet about

    00:00:58 our sun and about our solar system the wealth of knowledge to be gleaned from the moon will inspire a new generation of thought and action without fail every major program and mission nasa has invested in has led to technologies and capabilities that have shaped our culture the breakthroughs of the artemis era will define our generation and the

    00:01:19 generations to follow the tens of thousands of jobs associated with propelling us to the moon today are just the beginning of a lunar economy that will see hundreds of thousands of new jobs develop around the world this is not an ambition of one entity or one country the exploration of the moon is a shared effort woven together by a desire for the

    00:01:41 greater good why the moon because the missions of tomorrow will be sparked by the accomplishments of the artemis generation today because the ambition to go has already begun and because mars is calling we need to learn what it takes to establish community on another cosmic shore so let's camp close before pushing out

    00:02:04 and so we go to the moon now not as a series of isolated missions but to build a community on and around the moon capable of proving how to live on other worlds [Music] we'll use the lessons for more than 50 years of peaceful exploration to send a new generation to the lunar

    00:02:32 surface to stay we will anchor our efforts on the lunar south pole to establish the artemis-based camp positioning us for long-term science and exploration of the lunar surface we will prove what it takes to assemble a complex ship in deep space we will perfect descending down to and returning from a distant surface we will learn how humans can survive and

    00:02:56 thrive in a partial gravity environment with improved species designs mobile habitats and with reconnaissance robots pre-positioning and relocating supplies we will learn how to utilize the resources we find on these other worlds starting with finding water ice and purifying it to drinkable water and refining that into hydrogen for fuel and oxygen to breed

    00:03:17 we will establish fission power plants on the surface of the moon capable of supporting a growing community of efforts and we will expand the logistics supply chain to enable commercial and international partners to resupply and refuel deep space outposts [Music] none of this is simple

    00:03:38 or easy but nothing in our history ever has been the ankle has landed he got a bunch this kind of continuous lunar presence is a natural extension of all that we've learned in low earth orbit and what we will accomplish there will ensure the monumental missions to mars are within reach as we ready the launch of the first

    00:04:09 artemis mission and as commercial companies ready their lunar landers for the first private payload deliveries we have already begun to take the next step [Music] you