The 2020s have already seen many lunar landing attempts, although several of them have crashed or toppled over. With all the excitement surrounding the prospect of humans returning to the Moon, both commercial interests and scientists stand to gain.
The Moon is uniquely suitable for researchers to build telescopes they can’t put on Earth because it doesn’t have as much satellite interference as Earth, nor a magnetic field blocking out radio waves. But only recently have astronomers like me started thinking about potential conflicts between the desire to expand knowledge of the universe on one side and geopolitical rivalries and commercial gain on the other and how to balance those interests.
As an astronomer and the co-chair of the International Astronomical Union’s working group Astronomy from the Moon, I’m on the hook to investigate this question.
