The United Nations approved the creation of the International Moon Day (IMD) as an annual educational, cultural and scientific event. The International Moon Day is to be observed annually on 20 July to raise awareness among the public and generate support for sustainable Moon Exploration and Utilization. The International Moon Day encourages and promotes events around the globe on 20 July, including community panel discussion, lectures, webinar, concerts exhibits and screening of educational videos.

The Moon Village Exploration Analogues (MVA) Working Group provides a forum for identifying and coordinating activities related to terrestrial analogues for the Moon Village. It also addresses the associated topic of the use of the Moon as an analogue/testbed for future exploration of Mars and other destinations. This Working Group will support the creation of Analogue test sites around the world as a tool to contribute to capacity building in space developing countries and in general as outreach to the public.

In order to support the International Moon Day (IMD) and demonstrate the leadership of the MVA, the Moon Village Exploration Analogues (MVA) Working Group is organizing an International Moon Day Tele-Robotics event for schools and universities. In this event groups of up to 4 students from each institution can tele-operate a lunar rover prototype in Canada or Hawai’i, USA from any location around the world.

There are 5 groups that have graciously agreed to provide a robot and tele-operations software for the International Moon Day event on July 19 & 20, 2024.

Partners

Registration

Schools and Universities are invited to sign up below for a tele-robotics experience. Groups of 4 students can be accommodated in each time slot. The sessions are limited to one slot per institution and the reservations are on a “first come – first served” basis. In order to make sure that people from all over the world get the chance to participate, reservations exceeding 2 per country, will go on a waitlist.

Please sign up soon to avoid disappointment! Upon acceptance, the Moon Village Association will send further instructions for logistics and software preparation to tele-operate a robot on July 19-20, 2024!

Registration is now Closed

NeuroSpace HiveR Rover

Introducing HiveR, the future of moon exploration. Our rover is modular, flexible, and transferable for use on earth and beyond. Equipped with state-of-the-art hardware and software, HiveR is engineered to the highest degree of precision and safety. It’s space exploration reimagined.

Discover the HiveR Ecosystem, revolutionizing global rover control. Seamlessly command from anywhere, experience unmatched flexibility, and explore beyond boundaries with state-of-the-art technology. Navigate the future, today.

Experience the future of robotics with our central Mission Control Center, which effortlessly establishes a wireless connection to a fleet of robots. This plug-and-play wonder integrates seamlessly into your network and can be easily expanded with your systems. Thanks to the browser-based user interface, control is intuitive and accessible from anywhere. Revolutionise your operations with state-of-the-art simplicity and connectivity.

Neurospace is hosting the IMD Main Event at Rostock Laage Airport, where the mock lunar testing trail is and the HiveR rovers will be located.

Mission Control  

The  Spacefarer platform empowers mission controllers working in distributed teams to command and monitor remote assets in space and on Earth.

The  Spacefarer Software platform is the operations powerhouse of Mission Control’s end-to-end solution. When combined with one or more of our applications, the solution provides core mission functions such as:

• Command, control, guidance, and navigation of spacecraft, planetary rovers, surface and orbital robots, payloads, guidance and robotic systems
• AI-based data processing of payloads and imagery
• Interfaces with common space software frameworks and protocols, such as CCSDS, NASA cFS, Cubesat, and others

Spacefarer is being used for upcoming lunar rover missions, so you / students will get a chance to use the same software platform as mission controllers for upcoming lunar rovers

Pacific International Space Center for Exploration Systems (PISCES) 

PISCES will provide the use of the HELELANI PLANETARY ROVER as a mobile testing platform for tele-robotic software and hardware systems. Named “Helelani” (Heavenly Travels), this 700-pound (318 kg) rover is outfitted with a suite of instruments and camera systems that can be controlled remotely via a handheld radio controller or through an internet connection from anywhere in the world. Helelani’s hardware and software systems are continually developed and refined.

The Moon Village Analogue (MVA) Working Group is organizing a tele-robotics event for the International Moon Day using the Helelani planetary rover. Each rover will be available for tele-operations from multiple sites across the globe in order to promote international collaboration and cooperation.

University of Adelaide – Australian Rover Challenge (ARCh)

The Australian Rover Challenge (ARCh) is an annual robotics competition held by the University of Adelaide, where university students from across Australia and around the globe, battle it out in a full-scale Lunar mission, using semi-autonomous rovers that they have designed and built themselves.

University of Adelaide will be participating in this year’s IMD Telerobotics Event, with one of the Australian Rover Challenge winning rovrers. More info on the rovers at the ARCh website

University of Alabama – Astrobotics

Alabama Astrobotics is a student design team at the University of Alabama formed in 2009 with the purpose of educating students about robotics through the design and build of extraterrestrial mining rovers.

For this year’s IMD Telerobotics Event, the team will provide their NASA Lunabotics Co-Champion 2024 rover. More info at Alabama Astrobotics website