SHANGHAI, April 23 (Xinhua) -- A total of 17 countries and international organizations, as well as more than 50 international research institutions have joined the China-initiated International Lunar Research Station (ILRS), a senior official of the China National Space Administration (CNSA) said Wednesday at a conference held in Shanghai.
In current international lunar exploration, traditional spacefaring nations continue to carry out missions, emerging space nations are constantly joining in, and commercial spaceflight is flourishing, Bian Zhigang, deputy director of the CNSA, noted at the International Conference on Developers of ILRS.
Lunar exploration activities are evolving from short-term missions to long-term construction, from single-craft exploration to multi-craft collaboration, and from national missions to international cooperation, Bian said. The modes of exploration and cooperation are undergoing fundamental changes, he added.
Bian stressed that the ILRS initiated by China will offer new opportunities and platforms for fostering global intelligence integration, technological innovation, inclusive cooperation, and shared development.
The ILRS integrates observation, exploration, scientific experiments, and in-situ resource utilization into a single system. It will conduct large-scale, long-time, multi-point continuous, and real-time synchronous observations, according to Wang Chi, director of the National Space Science Center of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) and a CAS academician.
The overall scientific objectives of the ILRS include lunar geology, lunar-based astronomical observation, space environment observation of the Sun-Earth-Moon system, lunar-based fundamental science experiments, and lunar in-situ resource utilization, Wang noted.
The CNSA has always adhered to the principles of equality, mutual benefit, peaceful utilization, and win-win cooperation, Bian noted. It welcomes international partners to participate in various stages of the ILRS and at all levels of the mission. This will promote the use of space technology to benefit humanity and advance the building of a community with a shared future for humanity in the field of outer space, he said.
More than 120 leaders of space agencies and experts and scholars from 13 countries, regions and international organizations attended the meeting. ■