The moon has fascinated people from time immemorial. We have all spent nights staring up at the starry sky, looking at the moon in wonder. For most of us, travel to the moon is out of reach. But now, you have the opportunity to send your tech to the moon!
NASA’s new lunar exploration program is the Artemis Program. As human space exploration evolves toward a permanent presence on the lunar surface, In situ Resource Utilization (ISRU) will become increasingly important. Resupply missions are very expensive. We need to develop practical and affordable ways to identify and use lunar resources, so that our astronaut crews can become more independent of Earth. Future astronauts have to be able to locate and collect lunar resources and then transform them into the essentials for life: breathable air, water for drinking and food production, building materials for shelter, rocket propellants, and more. Our mission capabilities will rapidly increase when useful products can be created from in-situ resources.
The ability to prospect, map, and characterize these in-situ resources not only increases NASA’s progress towards a sustained presence on the moon, but also could revolutionize mining, purification systems, the pharmaceutical industry, and other commercial industries - much as we realized enormous technological benefits and advances from the Apollo Program. NASA has issued this challenge to the global community to develop miniaturized payloads that can be sent to the moon in the next 1-4 years and bridge lunar strategic knowledge gaps.
Payloads that support prospecting for resources that help support a sustained human presence are highly desirable, in addition to payloads that enable lunar science, demonstrate new technologies and/or advance the use of resources found on the moon (in-situ resource utilization, ISRU).
Imagine a rover the size of your Roomba® crawling the moon’s surface. These small rovers developed by NASA and commercial partners provide greater mission flexibility and allow NASA to collect key information about the lunar surface. However, existing science payloads are too big, too heavy, and require too much power for these rovers and new, miniaturized payload designs are needed. Payloads need to be similar in size to a new bar of soap to fit cleanly inside the rover (maximum external dimensions: 100mm x 100mm x 50mm).
This ideation challenge will award $160,000 total in prizes across two categories. This ideation challenge is expected to be followed by new challenges to prototype, test, and deliver these miniaturized payloads. This larger effort will generate a maturation pipeline of next-generation instruments, sensors, and experiments that can be used for lunar exploration over the next few years.
What You Can Do To Cause A Breakthrough
The Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS) program supports the Artemis Program through the development and deployment of small robotic landers and rovers. These new lunar micro-rovers will be launching over the next several years to gather information about and conduct scientific research on the lunar surface. To meet the size, weight, and power constraints of these micro-rovers, new scientific payloads have to be designed, built, and tested in time for the different launch opportunities.
Additionally, NASA would like these next generation payloads to do more than just deploy sensors and collect information about the lunar environment. Continued advancement of lunar and space exploration requires demonstrations of new technologies that can be employed outside of Earth. Miniaturized payload proposals that actively run relevant experiments, or demonstrate new instrumentation in a lunar environment are highly desirable.
Although there are already many good ideas for miniaturized payloads, the struggle is to find those good ideas which are readily reduced to practice. This challenge wants to recognize and reward payload proposals that can demonstrate near-term technical readiness, high impact, and the ability to integrate with micro-rovers.
The timeline for establishing a pipeline of suitable payloads is aggressive. NASA plans to launch the first of these micro-rovers in 2022. To be successful in this ideation competition, your proposed miniaturized payloads will:
The full specifications for micro-rover payloads can be found under the Resources tab (Small Lunar Payload User's Guide). Participants are strongly encouraged to familiarize themselves with the specifications. Payloads do not have to be located on the top of the micro-rover. Additionally, note that these specifications represent the maximum limits for size, weight, power consumption, etc. NASA JPL has a strong desire for proposed payloads that are smaller and lighter than the limits described in the payload user’s guide. Key payload guidance includes:
There is particular interest in payloads that will help identify and characterize lunar resources, as well as those that will enable ISRU. The loose, fragmental material on the Moon’s surface is called regolith and is a product of meteoritic bombardment - it is the debris thrown out of the impact craters. Minable concentrations of resources in the regolith need to be mapped so NASA can select the best locations to send our astronauts. Important resources in the regolith include volatile compounds such as water, CO2, and methane. They are of special interest because they are essential for life support and can be used for propellant production. Regolith containing minerals with high concentrations of oxygen, carbon, titanium, and iron are also of interest. Sulfur is important too because it can be used as a binding agent for lunar construction. Many prospecting technologies for these minerals and elements are successfully used on Earth, but they need to be miniaturized, repackaged, and tailored for use on the Moon. Payloads are needed that can address these broad strategic knowledge gaps:
As mentioned above, the first CLPS micro-rover is scheduled to launch in 2022, with annual launches thereafter. The goal of this and subsequent challenges on this topic is to develop a pipeline of ready-for-launch payloads. To help achieve this goal, proposed miniaturized payloads must be at TRL 3 or greater. For those unfamiliar with the definitions for the different TRLs, a table of definitions is available under the Resources tab (Technology Readiness Level Definitions). The figure below provides a graphical representation of TRLs.
Broadly speaking, TRL 3 is achieved when proof of concept is demonstrated. By TRL 6, the technology has been reduced to practice with a working prototype. To ensure that proposed payloads are sufficiently mature, a Payload Specifications and Capabilities form must be completed as part of the submission form. A view-only version of this form is available under the Resources tab. The ability to thoughtfully and responsively complete this Payload Specifications and Capabilities form is a good indicator that your proposed payload idea is sufficiently mature to fare well in this challenge.
This challenge has a total prize purse of $160,000 that will be divided among a number of winners across 2 different categories. First prize winners in each category will each be awarded $30,000, second prize winners $15,000, and third prize winners $5000.
These generous ideation prizes are intended to motivate and reward thoughtful, comprehensive submissions for miniaturized payload proposals that ideally:
Please carefully review the evaluation criteria below to understand what is important to NASA.
| Award Categories | Prize Amount | Number Of Awards | Total | |
Lunar resource potential | First Prize - $30,000 | 1 | $30,000 | |
Second Prize - $15,000 | 3 | $45,000 | ||
Third Prize - $5000 | 5 | $25,000 | ||
Lunar environment | First Prize - $30,000 | 1 | $30,000 | |
Second Prize - $15,000 | 1 | $15,000 | ||
Third Prize - $5000 | 3 | $15,000 | ||
Total Prize Purse | $160,000 USD | |||
In addition to the prizes discussed above, winners will also receive the following non-monetary incentives:
Open to submissions: April 9, 2020
Submission deadline: June 8, 2020 @ 5pm ET
Judging: June 8 to July 10, 2020
Winners Announced: July 14, 2020
To advance beyond preliminary evaluation rounds, your proposal must, at a minimum:
Note that in the submission form, you will have to select to which category/knowledge gaps your proposed payload applies. All submissions within a given category will be evaluated and ranked against one another to determine first, second, and third prize winners. If you believe your proposed payload is applicable to more than one category, select the category where you feel it will be most impactful. NASA JPL reserves the right to move a submission to a different category if they believe it has been miscategorized.
| Section | Description | Overall Weight |
| Proposal quality | Quality of proposal: clear, concise writing; thoughtful and complete responses; realistic projections of time needed, effort expended, and outcomes attained. High-level project plan that demonstrates a potential path for future development of proposed payload. | 10 |
| Capabilities | Technical soundness of proposed payload. Likelihood that it can be successfully integrated into a micro-rover and used on the lunar surface. Clear description of new technology/instrumentation to be demonstrated, or specific experiment to be run, or other payload capability. | 30 |
| Technical Maturity | The likelihood that proposed payload can be developed and deployed in 1-4 years | 30 |
| Impact | The potential impact of proposed payload if it is successfully developed and deployed. | 25 |
| Innovation | Novelty or creativity of proposed approach. Elegance of design. Clever use of existing technologies or work-around of existing limitations/constraints. | 5 |
Your submission should include:
Note: submissions should be made by clicking the orange "Accept Challenge" button and then the "Begin Entry" button. Multiple entries are permitted, but we encourage you to focus on preparing one quality entry versus multiple entries.
Participation Eligibility:
The Prize is open to anyone age 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 (see: https://www.treasury.gov/resource-center/sanctions/Programs/Pages/Programs.aspx). If you are a NASA employee, a Government contractor, or employed by a Government Contractor, your participation in this challenge may be restricted.
Submissions must be made in English. All challenge-related communication will be in English.
No specific qualifications or expertise in the field of in situ or remote sensors is required. NASA encourages outside individuals and non-expert teams to compete and propose new solutions.
To be eligible to compete, you must comply with all the terms of the challenge as defined in the Challenge-Specific Agreement.
Intellectual Property
Innovators who are awarded a prize for their submission must agree to grant NASA a royalty free, non-exclusive, irrevocable, world-wide license in all Intellectual Property demonstrated by the winning/awarded submissions. See the Challenge-Specific Agreement for complete details.
Registration and Submissions:
Submissions must be made online (only), via upload to the HeroX.com website, on or before June 8, 2020, at 5:00 pm ET. No late submissions will be accepted.
Selection of Winners:
Based on the winning criteria, prizes will be awarded per the weighted Judging Criteria section above.
Judging Panel:
The determination of the winners will be made by HeroX based on evaluation by relevant NASA specialists.
Additional Information
