On Wednesday, private space start-up Moon Express unveiled its plans to land an interlocking team of space crafts on the moon by 2020. Moon Express, founded in 2010, released images and animations of its so-called MX Robotic Explorers, special robots that will be designed for mining and exploration.
Their first craft, the MX-1E, stands 4-and-a-half feet tall and 3 feet wide and will act as a base for other crafts, as it is built to connect with other models in a Lego-like fashion. Moon Express says the R2-D2-sized machine will be able to land up to 66 pounds, hop across the moon, and return to Earth.
The company then plans to build three more robots — the MX-2, MX-5, and MX-9 — after a successful launch of the MX-1E. These vehicles may be used to orbit the moon or carry payloads of minerals. In the future, they may act as deep space probes.
Subscribe to The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.
Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
Moon Express will use a newly designed "eco-friendly" engine to build its MX Robotic Explorers. The cost of one MX-1E will be around $10 million, and the company hopes to launch the MX-1E by the end of 2017. Moon Express is gunning for the $20 million Google Lunar X Prize with its robot endeavors; for the MX-1E to win, it will have to land on the lunar surface, travel at least 500 meters, and send photos and videos back to Earth.
Even if it doesn't win the Lunar X prize, Moon Express will continue to build the MX Robotic Explorers. The company also plans to work with NASA or commercial ventures to ferry mineral payloads back from the moon.
-
Gripping political thrillers to stream nowThe Week Recommends From power struggles to deadly conspiracies, these addictive shows are nail-bitingly tense
-
What to know before turning to AI for financial advicethe explainer It can help you crunch the numbers — but it might also pocket your data
-
Book reviews: 'The Headache: The Science of a Most Confounding Affliction—and a Search for Relief' and 'Tonight in Jungleland: The Making of Born to Run'Feature The search for a headache cure and revisiting Springsteen's 'Born to Run' album on its 50th anniversary
-
Rabbits with 'horns' sighted across Coloradospeed read These creatures are infected with the 'mostly harmless' Shope papilloma virus
-
Lithium shows promise in Alzheimer's studySpeed Read Potential new treatments could use small amounts of the common metal
-
Scientists discover cause of massive sea star die-offSpeed Read A bacteria related to cholera has been found responsible for the deaths of more than 5 billion sea stars
-
'Thriving' ecosystem found 30,000 feet underseaSpeed Read Researchers discovered communities of creatures living in frigid, pitch-black waters under high pressure
-
New York plans first nuclear plant in 36 yearsSpeed Read The plant, to be constructed somewhere in upstate New York, will produce enough energy to power a million homes
-
Dehorning rhinos sharply cuts poaching, study findsSpeed Read The painless procedure may be an effective way to reduce the widespread poaching of rhinoceroses
-
Breakthrough gene-editing treatment saves babyspeed read KJ Muldoon was healed from a rare genetic condition
-
Sea lion proves animals can keep a beatspeed read A sea lion named Ronan beat a group of college students in a rhythmic dance-off, says new study
