Same moon, different day: Artemis II begins new era of space exploration

For the first time since 1972, NASA is preparing to send humans toward the moon. The Artemis II mission is intended not to land, but to test the spacecraft, systems and human spaceflight capabilities needed for the next phase of exploration. The 10‑day mission will carry four astronauts on a sweeping lunar flyby designed to validate life‑support systems, deep‑space navigation and manual piloting techniques essential for future landings.

“Artemis is not just a return to the moon, but a gateway to living and working on another world,” said retired astronaut and aerospace engineering professor Dr. Bonnie Dunbar, who joined NASA in 1978. “We’re advancing science, testing technology and forging the path to Mars.”

Exciting projects like the Texas A&M Space Institute, under construction at NASA Johnson Space Center in Houston, and TAMU‑SPIRIT, an Aggie-led external research facility that will be used on the International Space Station, are putting A&M at the center of modern space exploration.

But just how much has space science and technology advanced, and what lessons have we learned from the past?

Nostradamus has nothing on Jules Verne

Legendary science‑fiction author Jules Verne imagined human spaceflight to the moon in 1865; just over a century later, it became reality.

Dunbar says the works of Verne and H.G. Wells sparked her early interest in space; growing up on a cattle ranch in Washington state, her family didn’t have television. Her engineering skills were forged there, too: “We didn’t have hardware stores down the street,” she said, laughing. “So you had to innovate, you had to conserve.” That included electricity. “No one turned on their lights at night because electricity had just been brought in. We’re out in the country; we can see all the stars — why pay for lights at night when you can see the Milky Way?”

Artemis is an opportunity to recapture that national sense of discovery and to remind the public that exploration fuels innovation far beyond NASA’s launch pads.

In hindsight, Verne’s vision was strikingly close to what Apollo 11 would later achieve. He placed the launch site in Florida, envisioned a three‑person crew, closely matched the dimensions of the Apollo command module, described chemical systems to remove carbon dioxide and predicted a Pacific Ocean splashdown.

Still, Verne’s predictions weren’t perfect.

His fictional mission relied on a giant cannon — a method that would expose astronauts to fatal G-forces. Apollo 11 instead relied on the sustained thrust of the Saturn V rocket and, unlike Verne’s characters, real humans landed on the Moon, taking that historic “giant leap.”

‘We built Apollo with a slide rule’

Dunbar was selected as an astronaut in 1980 and flew on five space shuttle missions, logging more than 50 days in space, including participation in the first space shuttle docking with the Russian space station Mir. She also served as payload commander for a major microgravity research mission. Today, she leads research in aerospace human systems at Texas A&M, focusing on the spacesuits, habitats and human performance challenges central to NASA’s Artemis missions.

Artemis II will be the agency’s first crewed flight aboard the Space Launch System (SLS) rocket and the Orion spacecraft, marking a major step in America’s return to deep space.

“Building on the uncrewed Artemis I mission, which sent Orion 1.4 million miles beyond the moon and back, Artemis II will begin with two Earth orbits,” Dunbar said, “including a high‑Earth orbit before the crew embarks on a trajectory that will take them thousands of miles beyond the lunar far side — the farthest any humans will have traveled from Earth.”

NASA describes Artemis as a long‑term campaign to explore more of the moon than ever before and establish a sustainable presence to prepare astronauts for missions to Mars. Unlike Apollo’s equatorial landing sites, Artemis missions will target the lunar south pole, a region marked by rugged terrain, sweeping shadow patterns and permanently shadowed craters that may hold water ice.

The contrast between then and now still amazes Dunbar. “We built Apollo with a slide rule,” she said.

Back then, engineers relied on drawings and hand calculations. Today, spacecraft can be designed and tested in virtual environments using advanced simulations.

“We didn’t have the modeling capability,” she said. “Now, programs allow engineers to build three‑dimensional color models, rotate them around in virtual space; we used drawings.”

As director of Texas A&M’s Aerospace Human Systems Laboratory, Dunbar works with faculty and students applying those tools. “Students have tools now that we couldn’t even imagine,” she said.

“Spaceflight demands new materials, new engineering solutions and new medical understanding, all of which benefit life on Earth,” she said. “Artemis is an opportunity to recapture that national sense of discovery and to remind the public that exploration fuels innovation far beyond NASA’s launch pads.”

From analog risk to digital capability

For retired astronaut Col. Michael Fossum, Artemis II represents both a technological milestone and a threshold in the arc of human exploration.

“This is a genuinely exciting moment,” Fossum said. “For the first time in more than 50 years, NASA is sending people back toward the moon, and we’re doing it with an entirely new spacecraft and rocket. Artemis II is about proving we’re ready to move beyond low-Earth orbit again.”

Fossum was selected as a NASA astronaut in 1998 and flew on three missions, logging more than 194 days in space aboard the space shuttle and the International Space Station. He performed seven spacewalks totaling more than 48 hours and served as commander of the International Space Station during Expedition 29 in 2011. Today, he is vice president and chief operating officer of the Texas A&M University at Galveston campus.

Artemis II will push Orion’s life‑support systems over nearly 10 days, far beyond Earth’s magnetic protection. “When you get out beyond about 350 or 400 miles above the Earth, you no longer get protection from the Earth’s magnetic field, so the humans are exposed to a lot more radiation,” Fossum said. “They’ll have radiation badges on them to measure the doses they get, and we’re going to find out how good our shielding really is.”

He also contrasted Orion with the spacecraft of his own training. “In those days, the space shuttle had a thousand switches, and some of them thrown at the wrong time could be disastrous,” he said. “Today’s spacecraft use digital safeguards that block dangerous commands before they can be executed.

“Spaceflight has shifted from an era of analog risk to one of digital capability.”

The inspiration behind Artemis remains deeply personal for Fossum. “I was 11 when we landed on the moon and dreamed about flying in space myself,” he said. “And I thought, ‘Well, we’re going to the moon now, so Mars in about 20 or 30 years, that’ll be about perfect for me.’”

He started a “Mars notebook” at age 12, “digging information out of encyclopedias, because there was no Internet.”

Though he’s unlikely to make the trip to Mars himself, he said, “I look forward to seeing humans put the first footprints on Mars. Space exploration is inspirational, a force that continues to pull young people into engineering, science and other challenging paths.”

Texas A&M leading in space research

Both astronauts emphasized the role universities play in advancing spaceflight.

“Industry depends on universities to do the research and development that provides the basis to go do these amazing things,” Dunbar said. “You’ve got to fund your universities.”

Fossum pointed to the TAMU-SPIRIT project as an example of how university research is moving directly into orbit. “We’re launching a university test facility that’s prepared on the inside, and then moved to the outside of the space station,” he said. Testing hardware this way helps NASA identify problems early, “not for the first time on the lunar surface, which is a very expensive way to do research.”

He also emphasized the hands‑on experience students are gaining: “Our student teams get to actually build the flight hardware and get it launched.”

A bridge between eras

Artemis II is more than a test flight — it’s a bridge between eras, honoring the boldness of Apollo while embracing the technologies and scientific questions of a new century.

As Verne wrote in From the Earth to the Moon, “How many things have been denied one day, only to become realities the next!”