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Speaker 1: Welcome to brain Stuff from How Stuff Works, Hey, brain

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Speaker 1: Stuff Lauren vog Obam here. NASA has announced that it

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Speaker 1: has selected a dozen payloads of scientific equipment that it

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Speaker 1: plans to fly to the Moon on private commercial rockets

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Speaker 1: and landers. The missions planned for later in twenty nineteen

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Speaker 1: are an early step toward achieving the space agency's overarching

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Speaker 1: goal to send astronauts back to the Moon via commercial spacecraft.

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Speaker 1: In NASA's renewed focus on the Moon reflects a late

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Speaker 1: seventeen policy shift by the Trump administration, which decided that

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Speaker 1: these space agencies should return to the Moon, which was

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Speaker 1: last visited by Apolo seventeen astronauts back in December of

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Speaker 1: nineteen seventy two. Previously, the Obama administration had abandoned a

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Speaker 1: planned lunar mission, partly because of cost, in favor of

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Speaker 1: focusing upon going to Mars in the twenty thirties. We

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Speaker 1: spoke with Steve Clark, the Deputy Associate Administrator for Exploration

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Speaker 1: in NASA's Science Mission A Directorate. He explained that the

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Speaker 1: missions flown by commercial lunar payload services will include a

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Speaker 1: mixture of scientific instruments and technology demonstrations. He said, we

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Speaker 1: want to fly a mixture as much as we can,

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Speaker 1: so they collectively can provide data to the science community

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Speaker 1: and to the folks who are designing the next human lander.

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Speaker 1: The scientific instruments sent to the Moon will be, Clark said,

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Speaker 1: trying to characterize the lunar surface, looking for hydrogen molecules

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Speaker 1: and actual traces of water or water ice in the soil,

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Speaker 1: and looking for various other elements there on the lunar surface.

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Speaker 1: But those studies will do more than just add to

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Speaker 1: our knowledge of Earth's natural satellite. NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstein

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Speaker 1: said an a press release. We know there are volatiles

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Speaker 1: at the poles on the Moon, and quite frankly, that

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Speaker 1: water ice could represent rocket fuel. If we have the

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Speaker 1: capacity to generate rocket fuel from the surface of the

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Speaker 1: Moon and get them into orbit around the Moon, we

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Speaker 1: could use that to build a fueling depot. On the

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Speaker 1: technology side, one payload will include solar energy technology to

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Speaker 1: attempt to advance the engineering of solar cells, hopefully making

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Speaker 1: them more efficient. That will benefit space missions that are

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Speaker 1: dependent upon solar energy, but the work will have applications

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Speaker 1: back on Earth as well. Other technology being tested involves entry,

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Speaker 1: descent and landing systems, which will help improve the design

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Speaker 1: of future lunar landers, including the human lander that eventually

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Speaker 1: will take astronauts to the lunar surface again. NASA's long

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Speaker 1: range plan also calls for building a lunar orbital station

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Speaker 1: in the twenties, which will serve as a platform both

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Speaker 1: for observing the lunar surface and staging manned exploration missions.

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Speaker 1: Having instruments on the lunar surface as well as in

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Speaker 1: orbit around the Moon will give humanity to new valuable

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Speaker 1: vantage points from which to explore the Moon and beyond.

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Speaker 1: Unlike the Apollo program, the commercial space industry will be

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Speaker 1: heavily involved in the effort transporting astronauts to the orbital

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Speaker 1: station and down to the surface. The agency already has

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Speaker 1: announced plans to work with space companies to develop reuse

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Speaker 1: a lunar landers. Those spacecraft could shuttle back and forth

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Speaker 1: between the lunar orbital platform and the surface of the Moon.

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Speaker 1: We also spoke via email with Dale scran, the executive

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Speaker 1: vice president of the National Space Society, which is a

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Speaker 1: nonprofit group whose goal is to promote a space faring civilization.

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Speaker 1: He said that they support NASA's strategy. Quote the fundamental

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Speaker 1: advantage of a lunar orbital system in the support of

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Speaker 1: lunar exploration and development is that it can be a

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Speaker 1: gas station where reusable lunar landers dock and are refueled.

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Speaker 1: NASA's recently announced human lander reference design, which features two

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Speaker 1: reusable components, the ascent stage and space tug, along with

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Speaker 1: a tanker to bring fuel to the lunar orbital station,

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Speaker 1: are a constructive but partial step in this direction. At

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Speaker 1: this point, Scran says that putting boots on the Moon

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Speaker 1: in the near future no longer should be viewed as

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Speaker 1: a desirable goal in itself, but rather as a means

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Speaker 1: to further a larger plan of space colonization. He said,

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Speaker 1: humans on the Moon should grow organically out of what

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Speaker 1: we are doing on the Moon, not appear as a

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Speaker 1: stunt in imitation of Apollo. Two potential goals for lunar

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Speaker 1: return include mining oxygen to fuel future Mars trips and

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Speaker 1: building a radio telescope on the dark side of the

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Speaker 1: Moon to take advantage of the unique radio quiet on

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Speaker 1: the side of the Moon faces away from the Earth.

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Speaker 1: Both of these goals will almost certainly include humans on

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Speaker 1: the lunar surface, but boots are not the primary goal.

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Speaker 1: We will certainly keep you in the loop as more

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Speaker 1: news comes to light. Today's episode was written by Patrick

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Speaker 1: Jake Tiger and produced by Tyler Clang for iHeartMedia and

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Speaker 1: how Stuff Works. For more on this and lots of

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Speaker 1: other topics that more than scratch the surface, visit our

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Speaker 1: home planet, how stuff works dot com.