(Shanghai) Samples of lunar soil brought back by China’s Chang’e-5 space mission in 2020 contain traces of water, researchers said in a study published in a scientific journal.
The announcement reflects the scientific interest in China’s ambitious space program, which aims to send a manned mission to the Moon by 2030.
Examination of the samples “revealed the presence of traces of water,” the group of scientists from Chinese universities wrote in the study published Monday by the English-language journal Nature Astronomy.
Chang’e-5 was the first space mission in decades to successfully return lunar samples to Earth.
An infrared detector from the American space agency (NASA) had already confirmed the existence of water on the Moon in 2020. Scientists have also found traces of water in recent analyses of samples dating from the 1960s and 1970s.
But the Chang’e-5 samples come from a “much higher latitude,” providing new clues about what form water takes on the moon’s surface, the Chinese scientists write.
The samples suggest that “water molecules may persist in sunlit areas of the Moon as hydrated salts,” they note.
Last month, another Chinese probe, Chang’e-6, brought back to Earth the first samples ever brought back from the far side of the Moon.
China has significantly developed its space programs over the past thirty years, injecting billions of euros into this sector in order to catch up with the American, Russian and European leaders.
In 2019, the Asian giant landed a spacecraft (the Chang’e-4 probe) on the far side of the Moon, a world first.
In 2021, China landed a small robot on Mars.
The country hopes to launch its first manned mission to the moon by 2030. It also plans to build a lunar base.