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Published online 3 August 2006 | Nature | doi:10.1038/news060731-10

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Japan aims to build Moon base by 2030

Ambitious plan surprises fellow space agencies.

Japan's space agency has provoked surprise among other space experts by re-affirming its ambition to build a habitable base on the Moon within decades. At a lunar exploration symposium in Tokyo this week, head of the country's lunar and planetary exploration programme Junichiro Kawaguchi announced a deadline of 2020 for sending astronauts to the Moon, and 2030 for constructing the base.

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