Access

Feature

Nature Geoscience 2, 234–236 (1 April 2009) | doi:10.1038/ngeo481

Back to the Moon

Paul Spudis

Since the pioneering Apollo missions ended the first phase of intense lunar exploration some three decades ago, lunar samples and remote sensing data have continued to yield a first-order understanding of the Earth's only major natural satellite. Two robotic missions to the Moon in the 1990s, Clementine and Lunar Prospector, provided us with global maps of the chemical and mineralogical composition of the surface, topography, gravity and other properties that have greatly expanded our understanding.