In fact, the thing called the "Solar Capture and Reflection Tracking Device" is a mirror with signal tracking.

As you can see from its structure, its function is to reflect the sun's rays, and then keep tracking the solar panels of the lunar rover carrying beacons, so that the lunar rover can also get sunlight in permanent shadowed areas.

This method was not original to the Navigator, nor was it conceived by the Tianxia Space Agency, this method has been around for a long time.

But when it comes to being used on the moon, that's the first time.

Its previously planned use was more straightforward, not to charge the rover, but to "boil water".

There is ice in the shadow area of the moon, which is almost a consensus, and the rest is the question of how to land on the moon and how to find it.

These -249°C permanently shadowed craters are the coldest naturally occurring places in the solar system, and excavation equipment requires heat and energy to extract them and then convert them into fuel.

Because plutonium-based batteries based on natural decay heat production are too expensive for private companies, even for the national team's scientific missions, lunar mining is best done by using the sun's energy.

That's a lot cheaper.

A small town in Europa was inspired by a giant mirror erected on a hill more than a decade ago, creating a bright spot in the central square in the cold and gloomy winter.

Scientists hope that future lunar ice miners will follow suit, where sunlight from the mountains can be folded directly into the crater to heat the ice and convert it into steam, where the condensate will be transferred to a treatment plant, where it will be broken down into hydrogen and oxygen with the help of solar energy, which will be stored for fuel or put into fuel cells.

However, this method is suitable for well-established lunar bases, and if you use this method when you don't have anything, it will only be a waste of water.

Another way is to take a few more steps, that is, the rover can scoop up the soil with ice and heat it in a furnace to release water, which can be heated directly by irradiating it with a high-energy laser, or it can be irradiated to the solar panels and then converted into electrical energy for heating.

Someone has tested it in the laboratory, and the results are all feasible, and how to achieve it on the moon needs to be verified in detail.

If large chunks of ice are not available, then there is another source of water on the Moon, which is lunar soil, also known as surface cuttings.

Surface rock chips contain silicon and metal oxides, and on average 43% oxygen by mass fraction, which can be found everywhere on the Moon.

Oxygen extracted from the soil can provide energy to scientifically or economically valuable bases far from the polar regions and produce useful by-products such as rare metals.

Surface cuttings do not give up their "wealth" easily, and releasing oxygen from chemical bonds is more energy-intensive than heating ice.

Theoretically, the reactor could use a large mirror to refract sunlight into a special reactor that heats the lunar soil to more than 900 °C until it shines.

At this temperature, hydrogen or carbon brought up from the earth can strip oxygen from minerals and combine with hydrogen to form water.

More than ten years ago, some scientists used simulated lunar surface rock chips in the laboratory to prove that this operation is feasible, but the low gravity and vacuum environment were not tested, so whether it can be used on the moon also needs to be verified in the field.

Researchers hope to improve the technology a little bit more and reduce the amount of stuff that has to be brought from Earth.

A space research team is developing a prototype that can work at low temperatures, recycling all inputs, such as methane and hydrogen, so that only soil needs to be consumed to get water and fuel.

But it would take decades for a piece of equipment to produce enough fuel to put the original Apollo type of lunar lander into orbit, so to actually use it, it would have to run multiple reactors on the moon at the same time.

Other teams are trying to deoxidize solid metal ores by electrifying a molten salt bath instead of a chemical reaction, a technology they hope will provide high-quality alloys for the space industry and, in the future, high-purity metals for machines on the moon.

It is estimated that 190 tons of lunar soil contains 15~16 tons of oxygenated iron minerals, which can produce 1 ton of oxygen, and only 1 ton of oxygen needs to be produced in one year to maintain the survival needs of 10 people on the moon.

Secondly, in order for humans to live in a self-sufficient system on the moon, they must also ensure a food supply, and food, which also needs water.

Where does the food come from?

In recent years, scientists have conducted a large number of biological experiments on the space station and have cultivated more than 100 kinds of "space plants", including wheat, corn, oats, soybeans, tomatoes, turnips, cabbage, sugar beets, lettuce, etc.

Moreover, it has been proved that under the conditions of weightlessness in space, plant seeds have a higher germination rate, faster growth, and earlier flowering or heading time in lunar soil.

Scientists have also conducted experiments on some animals and proved that weightlessness does not affect the birth of new life.

On the space station, fruit flies can mate, lay eggs, and reproduce offspring just like they do on Earth.

Bees build nests, and queens give birth to children.

The 60 quail eggs sent to the spacecraft can still hatch after returning to the ground.

After 59 days on the spacecraft, the eggs were successfully hatched when they returned to the ground.

Mammals are no exception, female rats and male rats are placed in cages and sent to space, and they still live together, and female rats are still conceived and pregnant, and the first generation of "space rats" are born after returning to the ground.

As long as a lunar agricultural and breeding base is established on the moon, the food source for the people on the moon will be fully guaranteed.

Studies have also shown that energy supply from lunar bases is less of a problem.

Because there is no wind or rain on the moon, it is clear and cloudless, there is sunlight all day long, and there is no atmospheric absorption, and the radiation intensity of the sun is about 1.5 times that of the earth.

Therefore, the moon can use solar energy for lighting, heating, heating, and power generation.

Of course, if necessary...... Well, after the technology matures, a nuclear power plant can also be built on the moon to ensure an adequate supply of energy to the base.

It can be said that scientists are very optimistic about the survival exploration of human beings on the moon and have done a lot of experiments for this.

It's almost time for a real lunar experiment.

No, there is a lunar experiment, and the Chang'e-4 spacecraft carried a miniature biosphere in the early days, and a seed in it successfully grew a sprout.

It's just that the microbiosphere is too "miniature", not so much an ecosphere as an eco-tank, with a total weight of only 3 kilograms, so it is not equipped with a heating function, so that after entering the moonlit night stage, the temperature inside the ecosphere plummets with the ambient temperature, and the plant shoots die immediately.

Now, the Navigator and Tianxia are coming, as well as the completed astronaut survival module.

The astronauts' mission sequence includes the cultivation of plants and animals, and there is a corner in the survival module, with planting modules and breeding boxes, which are specially used to cultivate plants and raise small animals.

So not only do fuels need water, they also need water, and they can't just bring water from the earth.

And on the evening of the second day after the astronauts landed on the moon, the Navigator and the Tianxia Space Agency released a picture at the same time.

The picture is clear, illuminated by lights, and under the light is a large gray earth, and the most striking thing is a white spacesuit arm, or the gray crystal in the palm of the hand.

Under the illumination of the light, the crystalline body reflected an inexplicable brilliance in some places, and some translucent places were more eye-catching.

Quartz?

Crystal?

No, just a dirty piece of ice!

Yes, the name given to that picture by the Navigator and the Space Agency is "A Dirty Piece of Ice".

There is no need to guess, people directly gave the answer to the riddle.

Gray earth, spacesuit arms, ice!

Outside.

“！！！”

"Wait, isn't it, isn't it the kind of ?!! I thought"

"It's only the first day, is there such a big discovery?"

"This is a real hammer, the moon is born to be a transit station for human beings to go to space."

"If you have a lot of cattle and find water on the moon, you are equivalent to having everything!!"

"Ahhh