THE MOON — NASA plans to launch the Artemis II mission in the coming days, sending four astronauts on a voyage around the Moon. The mission will pave the way for a future lunar landing and an eventual Moon base.

The Artemis programme has cost an estimated $93 billion to date. It follows the Apollo programme of the 1960s and 1970s, which achieved six crewed lunar landings and included the first human footsteps on the Moon.

The Moon contains metals such as iron and titanium, and helium. Helium is used in applications ranging from superconductors to medical equipment. "The Moon has got the same elements in it that we have here on Earth," said Sara Russell, a planetary scientist at the Natural History Museum. "An example is rare earth elements, which are very scarce on Earth, and there might be parts of the Moon where these are concentrated enough to be able to mine them."

Water is considered the most valuable resource on the Moon. "It has water trapped in some of its minerals, and it also has substantial amounts of water at the poles," Russell said. Permanently shadowed craters on the Moon can accumulate ice deposits. Water on the Moon can provide drinking water for astronauts, be split into hydrogen and oxygen to provide breathable air, and serve as fuel for spacecraft.

The Apollo missions of the 1960s and 1970s were driven by a race for space dominance between the United States and the Soviet Union. China has landed robotic spacecraft and rovers on the Moon and aims to send humans to the Moon by 2030. The United States and China both seek access to lunar regions with abundant resources.

The 1967 Outer Space Treaty prohibits countries from claiming ownership of the Moon. "Although you can't own a piece of the land because of the UN treaty, you can basically operate on that land without anybody interfering with it," said Helen Sharman, the first British astronaut. "The big thing right now is to try to grab your piece of land. You can't own it, but you can use it. And once you're there, you've got it for as long as you want it."

NASA plans to use a Moon base to test technologies for providing air, water, power generation, and habitat construction to protect against extreme temperatures and space radiation. "Going to the Moon and staying there for a sustained period is much safer, much cheaper and much easier to be a test bed for learning how to live and work on another planet," said Libby Jackson, head of space at the Science Museum.

"These are all technologies that if you try them for the first time on Mars and they go wrong, it's potentially catastrophic. It's much safer and much easier to try them out on the Moon," Jackson said. NASA aims to send humans to Mars by the 2030s.