October 22, 2024 - NASA has unveiled the LunaRecycle Challenge, offering up to $3 million in prize money for innovative waste management solutions designed for long-duration lunar missions. This ambitious competition is a crucial part of NASA's Artemis program, aiming to foster the development of technologies that recycle and reduce waste, ensuring safer and more sustainable lunar exploration.
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| NASA Offers $3 Million Prize for Innovative Lunar Waste Management Solutions |
The LunaRecycle Challenge is divided into two tracks: the Prototype Build track and the Digital Twin track. The Prototype Build track focuses on designing and developing physical systems to recycle solid waste on the lunar surface, while the Digital Twin track involves creating virtual models of complete recycling systems and their end products.
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| NASA Launches LunaRecycle Challenge With $3 Million Prize For Innovative Recycling Solutions In... |
NASA is seeking solutions that can efficiently recycle inorganic waste streams, such as food packaging, discarded clothing, and materials from science experiments, transforming them into useful products vital for scientific and operational endeavors on the Moon. The competition emphasizes the creation of energy-efficient, low-mass, and low-impact recycling solutions to enhance the sustainability of extended lunar missions.
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| Prizes, Challenges, and Crowdsourcing |
Open to participants worldwide, the challenge invites teams to submit their Phase 1 designs by March 31, 2025. NASA will select the top entries to advance to Phase 2, where functional models of the proposed systems will be built and tested. The winning designs will receive substantial prize money, with $1.4 million awarded for the best working prototype and $600,000 for the top virtual model.
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| The Luna Recycle Challenge |