China's Chang'e-6 lunar module has returned to Earth after two months in space on the "dark" side of the moon.
The spacecraft, which launched on May 3, 2024, has achieved a significant milestone by successfully collecting and preparing to return the first-ever samples from the far side of the moon.
The mission's lander, which touched down in the South Pole-Aitken Basin on June 1, used a drill and scoop to gather approximately 4.4 pounds of lunar soil and rock. On Tuesday, Chang'e-6 crashed back down to Earth in China's northern Inner Mongolia region, bringing the moon rocks back home with it.
The lander collected the samples from the Apollo crater in the South Pole-Aitken Basin, which is a crater that is billions of years old, on the opposite side of the moon to Earth. It remained out of view to Earth until the 1960s when the first lunar orbiters sent back pictures of the moon's far side.
This marks the first time lunar samples have been brought back to Earth from the moon's far side—the nine other missions that have retrieved moon rocks and soil landed on the side facing us. Chang'e-6 is only the second ever landing on the moon's far side, after the Chang'e-4 mission in 2019. The samples from the far side, which is less affected by volcanic activity compared to the near side, could provide crucial insights into the moon's formation and history.
"The CE-6 samples, being the first obtained from the farside of the Moon, are expected to answer one of the most fundamental scientific questions in lunar science research: what geologic activity is responsible for the differences between the two sides?" Zongyu Yue, a geologist at the Chinese Academy of Sciences, said in a statement.
"There are significant differences between the farside and the nearside of the Moon in terms of lunar crustal thickness, volcanic activity, composition, etc., especially considering that CE-6 landed on the South Polar-Aitkin (SPA) Basin, the special terrane of the Moon."
The data from the samples will hopefully show how debris from early moon collisions dispersed across its surface and if there are any variations compared to findings from the nearside, which has an uneven terrain.
"My greatest hope is that the CE-6 samples contain some impact melts (fragments generated when smaller bodies crash into the Moon) from the Apollo Crater and the SPA basin, which can provide crucial constraints on the early impact flux of the Moon," said Zongyu. "Once this information is obtained, it will not only help clarify the role of early lunar meteorite impacts on the Moon's evolution but also be of great significance in analyzing the early impact history of the inner solar system."
Chang'e-6 wasn't the only time we visited our lunar neighbor this year: Japan landed on the moon in January, while in February, a U.S. craft landed on the moon for the first time in 50 years. Last year, India and Russia both sent landers to the moon.
China's Chang'e-7 is due to land on the south pole of the moon in 2026, with Chang'e-8 following it in 2028.
NASA, meanwhile, aims to send humans back to the moon as part of the Artemis missions, with hopes to have astronauts on the lunar surface possibly by 2026.
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Jess Thomson is a Newsweek Science Reporter based in London UK. Her focus is reporting on science, technology and healthcare. ... Read more
