HeroX, the social network for innovation and a crowdsourced solutions platform, has launched the crowdsourcing competition "NASA's Lunar Delivery Challenge" on behalf of the NASA Tournament Lab (NTL) and NASA's Langley Research Center. The goal of NASA's Artemis program is to land the first woman and the next man on the surface of the moon in 2024. By the next decade, NASA hopes to establish a sustained human presence on the moon. To do that, a way to unload all the supplies that arrive from Earth needs to be developed.
NASA expects to continuously send payloads to the lunar surface. Just as terrestrial logistics have to accommodate a wide range of cargo types originating from a variety of shipping containers, a lunar cargo handling system will have to be flexible enough to manage payloads ranging from small scientific instruments to large rovers and habitat modules and also be able to offload them from a variety of spacecraft.
"We are looking for broad concepts from the public, so this is not an engineer-specific challenge. We want to hear from everyone," said Paul Kessler, Aerospace Vehicle Design and Mission Analyst, NASA. "We are interested in concepts that range from simple to complex. We don't yet know what will work best, and that's why we're interested in every proposal. We are excited to see what people have to offer and to have them contribute to NASA's ambitious mission. This is the stuff that makes history."
"Replicating our everyday activities on the moon continues to be a challenge. Finding ways to do these things in a lunar environment is crucial to the success of a sustained human presence on the moon," said HeroX CEO Christian Cotichini. "The unloading of payloads is a critical part of that overall effort. NASA hopes it can once again leverage the brilliance of the crowd so that astronauts have access to the equipment and supplies they need."
The Challenge: NASA's Lunar Delivery Challenge asks the larger community to consider how cargo can be unloaded from lunar landers and other spacecraft while operating under lunar gravity and within other constraints of the lunar environment.
The Prize: Up to six participants submitting the top ideas will share a total prize purse of $25,000.
Eligibility to compete and win prize(s): The prize is open to anyone aged 18 or older participating as an individual or as a team. Individual competitors and teams may originate from any country, as long as United States federal sanctions do not prohibit participation (some restrictions apply).
To accept the challenge, visit herox.com/LunarDelivery