Over the next several years the space agencies
of the United States, Europe, Japan, India, China
and Russia are planning lunar explorations to identify sites
for lunar colonization with both the
United States and the People's Republic of China planning human
missions to the Moon by 2020. Japan
has stated interest in a 2025 human mission.
Between
2025 and 2050 Earth colonists will depart for the Moon
to build habitats, install solar
power
stations, mine resources, develop maglev trains, engineer
electromagnetic catapults, and conduct
deep
space astronomy. The human lunar population will greatly
expand after the third decade of the 21st
Century after gaining more extensive lunar living experience
and understanding of the lunar
surface.
Success of lunar colonists will
depend upon building an economy that will reduce dependence
on the
costly initial resources sent from Earth. Among the first
requirements will be to transform the
lunar
rogolith to oxygen, water, and rocket propellant to support
commercialization of the initial human
lunar bases. The lunar in-situ resources will then enable
human colonists to mine rare minerals for
use on Earth and begin manufacturing processes on the Moon. 
Surface reconnaissance, remote sensing,
and ground truthing for detailed lunar surface mapping
will
be essential to nearly every aspect of lunar colonization.
Having a high-quality understanding of
the lunar surface will dictate location of habitats,
perhaps in inactive lunar lava tubes. Habitat
location will determine the radius from which humans
may traverse to develop in-situ resources.
Upon locating frozen water-ice in
dark craters, humans will have to create means to transport
the
water-ice to development locations along the lunar surface.
Lunar topography will limit the
pathways
of maglev trains and other means to move raw materials.
Mining lunar regolith for oxygen and other
valuable minerals will require extensive mapping and
utilization of lunar GIS.
DEVELOP Scholars realize that it
is the current college and university students that will
enable
colonization of the Moon in the 21st Century. Lunar colonization
will require professionals with
knowledge in astroengineering, civil engineering, geochemistry,
space medicine research,
astrosociology,
astronomy, physics, computer sciences, manufacturing
management, agriculture, and a host of other
skills
to support permanent human activity of what will become
lunar towns and cities of the future.
Understanding the topography and
geology of the lunar surface through the best available
mapping
will be essential tools to the first explorers. DEVELOP
Scholars hope to contribute to the greater
understanding of the potential of lunar development through
Lunar GIS. Gaining surface knowledge
from
utilization of spacecraft data from Clementine, Lunar
Prospector, SMART-1, the Hubble Space
Telescope,
and other upcoming lunar missions, will provide DEVELOP
Scholars the opportunity to contribute to
what may prove to be the most important human endeavor
of the 21st Century.
