[NASA Press Release - 25.08.2008]
Reporters will have a unique chance to experience lunar life, including driving across and touching a simulated moonscape, on Monday, Sept. 8, at NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston.

The Lunar Exploration Workshop will be held from 1:30 p.m. to 5 p.m. CDT, immediately following morning briefings that preview NASA's next space shuttle mission. The STS-125 flight of Atlantis will be the final visit by astronauts to the Hubble Space Telescope.

[NASA Press Release - 19.08.2008]
NASA issued a Request for Information, or RFI, on Monday to gauge interest and solicit ideas from private companies in providing communications and navigation services that would support the development of exploration, scientific and commercial capabilities on the moon over the next 25 years.

NASA plans to establish science stations on the lunar surface beginning as early as 2013, followed by the return of humans to the moon and establishment of the first lunar outpost in 2020.

[NASA Press Release - 11.08.2008]
There are places on the Moon where the sun hasn't shined for millions of years. Dark polar craters too deep for sunlight to penetrate are luna incognita, the realm of the unknown, and in their inky depths, researchers believe, may lie a treasure of great value.

NASA is about to light one up.

Sometime between May and August 2009, depending on launch dates, the booster stage for NASA's LCROSS probe will deliberately crash into a permanently-shadowed lunar crater at 9,000 km/hr, producing an explosion equivalent to about 2,000 pounds of TNT (6.5 billion joules). The blast will jettison material out of the crater into broad daylight where astronomers can search the debris for signs of lunar water.

[NASA Press Release - 31.07.2008]
NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter, also known as LRO, has completed the first round of environmental testing at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md. These tests ensure the spacecraft is prepared for its mission to collect the highest resolution images and most comprehensive geological data set ever returned from the moon. The objective of the mission is to map the lunar surface in preparation for human missions to the moon, which are planned to occur by 2020.

[NASA Press Release - 30.07.2008]
NASA's Lunar Science Institute at Moffett Field, Calif., has announced its first international affiliate partner for conducting lunar science activities. Canada's University of Western Ontario, London, Ontario, will represent the Canadian lunar science community as part of the newly established Canadian Network for Lunar Science and Exploration.

"We are tremendously excited about this partnership," said S. Pete Worden, director of NASA's Ames Research Center at Moffett Field, Calif. "With the large number of U.S. and international missions focused on the moon, this is absolutely the right step forward."

[NASA Press Release - 28.07.2008]
NASA's Constellation Program has selected 11 companies and one university to independently develop concepts that contribute to how astronauts will live and work on the moon.

Each organization will conduct a 180-day study focused on a topic relevant to lunar surface systems. Selected organizations and topics are:

--Alternative Packaging Options: Oceaneering Space Systems of Houston

[NASA Press Release - 28.07.2008]
A NASA concept for lifting and manipulating materials on the lunar surface will be demonstrated for reporters at NASA's Langley Research Center in Hampton, Va., on Friday, Aug. 1.

NASA's Lunar Surface Manipulation System recently completed a successful June field test on the lunar-like landscape of Moses Lake, Wash. The system is a lifting and precision positioning device that will be used on items ranging from large airlocks and habitats to delicate scientific payloads. The robotic manipulator incorporates features that could help astronauts during early lunar outpost construction and follow-on operations. The principles behind the device also are directly applicable to future operations on the Martian surface.

[NASA Press Release - 25.08.2008]
NASA's Regolith Excavation Challenge is scheduled for Aug. 2-3, 2008, on the campus of the California Polytechnic State University in San Luis Obispo. The competition requires teams to build a roving excavator that can autonomously navigate, excavate, and transfer approximately 330 pounds of simulated lunar regolith, or lunar soil, into a collector bin within 30 minutes. The total prize purse is $750,000 with a first prize of $500,000.

[NASA Press Release - 11.07.2008]
Opportunities for conducting studies of the moon, on the moon and from the moon will be explored and lunar research findings discussed during a three-day Lunar Science Conference at NASA Ames Research Center, July 21-23, 2008.

The conference is co-sponsored by the NASA Lunar Science Institute, the Lunar and Planetary Institute, Houston, and NASA Ames Research Center. Approximately 400 scientists are expected to attend.

[Brown University Press Release - 09.07.2008]
A Brown University-led research team has for the first time discovered evidence of water that came from deep within the Moon, a revelation that strongly suggests water has been a part of the Moon since its early existence – and perhaps ever since it was created by a cataclysmic collision between the early Earth and a Mars-sized object about 4.5 billion years ago.