Is there life on Earth’s moon?

If NASA’s political, technical and financial plans go according to plan, the United States could leave a new footprint on the moon by the end of this decade. The landing, to be carried out during the Artemis 3 mission, will mark the first human return to the lunar surface since the Apollo 17 mission in December 1972.

According to Live ScienceArtemis 3 will be the first of several manned missions to land in the Artemis Polar Exploration Region at 84 degrees south latitude. Choosing a safe and scientifically valuable landing zone for Artemis 3 is a difficult task; But there is no doubt that great discoveries are coming, and one potential surprise could be the discovery of life on the moon.

New research suggests that future visitors to the Moon’s Antarctic region should look for evidence of life in ultracold craters located in permanently shadowed regions. These organisms may have made their way from Earth to the Moon.

Prabel Saxina, a planetary researcher at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, believes that microbial life could potentially survive in the harsh conditions near the moon’s south pole. According to recent research into the limits within which certain microbial life can survive, there may be potential hot spots for such life in the relatively protected areas of some airless celestial bodies.