Eeny, Meeny, Miney, Sample!

Background

Between 1969 and 1972, Apollo astronauts brought back 800 pounds of lunar rocks from six landing sites. How did they know what was the best rock to bring home? When two people walk along the beach, do they both pick up the same type of sea shells or fragments from the same shell?

All lunar samples may have some type of value, but some have more scientific importance than others, and the notion of “value” really depends on the interests of the scientist or engineer. With very limited time and tools to pick up and assess the rocks they gather, how can scientists get the most scientific and engineering “value” from astronauts’ time on the Moon’s surface? Some scientists and/or engineers care about the historical record of the Moon that tells a long story of the origins of our solar system. Some care about the potential for water. Some want to study how meteorites on Earth compare to lunar rock. Some want to build structures on the Moon and therefore need to know the properties of the soil. Many more competing priorities are relevant to today’s scientists and engineers, but in past missions there has been no way to assess the samples during the mission before leaving the Moon to give clear priorities as to which samples or parts of samples to bring home.

The goal of this challenge is to help increase the scientific and engineering value of each human lunar mission by assessing lunar samples in-situ before or during the mission and only collecting those samples or parts of samples that are of highest value to the specific mission.

Potential Considerations:

For your solution, devise a simulation of a human/robotic mission to the Moon that brings back only the most valuable specimens, and not "extra" material. Be sure to articulate how you are defining “value” in your mission – what purpose do the samples serve, and what characteristics make them “valuable” to you? Remember that value is not necessarily a monetary value, but the collection and return of any sample to Earth does have a cost to it, so your task is to be sure that you are working with the most important samples you can collect.

Some examples of solutions include (but are NOT LIMITED to):

• Describing a novel way to robotically explore and obtain samples ahead of time
• Designing tools for the crew to inspect in-situ, and select/cut/core the samples or rocks that are most valuable.
• Proposing a robotic mission to be flown that adapts Mars 2020 robotic capabilities to lunar surface missions so as to make the best use of astronaut time on the moon
• Exploring tools to obtain samples (e.g., a hand-held core drill, sample cutting tools, etc.) and nondestructive evaluation (NDE) inspection technologies such as 3D X-ray, X-ray Fluorescence (XRF), Scanning Electron Microscopy (SEM), Neutron Spectrometry, and others to be used on either human or robotic missions to get the most value per pound returned to Earth.
• Developing a ‘scouting’ robot may be tasked to find what areas to send the astronauts to for gathering samples.
• Designing a system to extract primary science data from the samples without the need to bring them to Earth for further study.
• Crafting whatever your brilliant minds can imagine!

Your solutions will be evaluated for the following metrics:

• Hours of astronaut time saved.
• Hours of extravehicular activity (EVA) astronaut time saved.
• Percent increase in value per pound of rock/soil leaving the Moon for Earth.
• Mass of rock/soil not returned because its value was determined in-situ.
• Use of mature systems – minimizing development and efforts to make them “space ready.”

Here are some tips to consider as you develop your solutions:

• Raw samples may be rocks, rock fragments, core samples, or dust.
• Interesting zones for obtaining samples may be considerable distances from a landing site.
• Some craters can be very dark and cold, and may have steep sides.
• Processed samples may need to preserve stratification; or, they may only need to include general mineral content.
• Samples that can be evaluated as they are gathered may add efficiency.

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