Chinese researchers transform lunar soil into source for rocket fuel, oxygen

A team of Chinese researchers announced that they managed to produce a source of rocket fuel and oxygen by converting actual lunar samples.

As Futurism reported, they discovered that lunar soil samples can act as a catalyst to convert carbon dioxide and water from astronauts’ bodies and environments into methane and oxygen, according to Yujie Xiong, the lead author of the group.

The scientists published their findings in the National Science Review journal, which could pose to be a potential gamechanger for future space missions as it would allow decreasing the weight of resources required to carry from the Earth if astronauts were able to fuel up for their return journeys by using resources available on site. It would also allow missions to extend their time spent in space.

"Considering that there are limited human resources at extra-terrestrial sites, we proposed to employ the robotic system to perform the whole electrocatalytic CO2 conversion system setup", the Chinese research team wrote.