and has a different perspective of earth um  it's impossible not to be you know changed  

by looking back on your home planet and having  a fresh appreciation of how tiny uh earth is  

and and how vulnerable it looks and how  fragile it looks in this vast universe

what do you think the attraction is of going  into space i think there's on several levels i  

mean it's attractive because it's the future  it's the future of exploration the unknown  

pushing boundaries also uh the future of  science and technology and engineering  

really the stuff we're doing in space is at the  cutting edge of what humans are capable of doing  

and what technology is capable of doing so it's  fascinating to many people are on different levels  

you talk about the importance of international  partnership i think no one will again say that  

is is that something that is becoming more  difficult because we're we're in generally  

troubled times of international cooperation is  that going to affect the the new race for space  

i don't think so if you look over uh the history  of the space programme since apollo sawyers first  

started working together in the 70s there's been  awful an awful lot of political tension between  

different factions there throughout that era  and the what we're doing in space and to many  

degrees what we do in science globally it has  an ability to transcend political differences  

so we have to work together as partnership now  we have to pool our resources pool our funding  

together and our technology and our expertise  and our ingenuity but that actually in itself  

has created this really strong partnership  which is fantastic and we'll continue on to our  

next project project which is to go back to the  moon uh so we're doing it in a more combined uh  

partnership we're doing it in a more sustainable  fashion not just to go back to the moon  

and return home but to go there and stay and as  a stepping stone onto mars so it's very exciting  

future but it does need political stability it  does need financial stability any long duration  

space program has to have those two things to work  and the one good thing that we have got to build  

on is this international collaboration obviously  first step the moon but we've been to the moon  

why do we want to go back yeah so there's a couple  of good reasons for going back to the moon firstly  

as we've we've barely scratched the surface uh  we you know got so much to learn about the moon  

the moon was probably formed from an early  collision with the earth so it's part of us  

and yet having been out there untouched for four  and a half billion years it acts as a repository  

of of information about the solar system's  formation and that can really teach us a lot  

and in addition in terms of exploration it's  a natural place to start learning about how to  

live and work proper properly on another  celestial body you know with a permanent  

presence and understanding that environment as a  stepping stone onto mars and potentially some of  

the moons of perhaps jupiter and saturn to go back  to the moon do we do we have the technology to go  

back and stay do we have the technology now or are  there missing bits that we still have to develop  

well there are bits that we have to develop but  we have the technology as in there is nothing  

outside of what is not possible with today's  manufacturing techniques and our capabilities  

um so we have already manufactured the spacecraft  that's going to take us there the orion  

we've already manufactured the the service module  the european service module for that spacecraft  

so that technology exists it's been manufactured  it's going to fly within the next couple of years  

the gateway is a smaller version of the  international space station there's nothing  

that we cannot do there that we haven't done  before and so the one element that we need to  

still develop more is the lander system but again  we've landed on the moon we know how to do that  

uh so there is no there are no uh hurdles that are  yet to overcome in order to get into the surface  

of the moon in terms of staying there uh we need  to put up habitation modules but there are some  

really ingenious ways we can do that uh we can  use inflatable modules we can use 3d printing  

techniques from lunar regolith all these kind  of technologies are being explored in the early  

stages i expect we'll use modules very similar  to what we've seen on space stations because  

that's easy for us to do but i expect things  like that the 3d printed you know uh habitation  

modules that's the thing that's certainly  within our grasp in the future or even using  

underground uh areas on the on the surface of the  moon which give us radiation protection as well  

and how do we make those communities sustainable  as in self-sustaining the way that we're going  

to make this sustainable is by improving the  technologies that we've already developed on  

the space station for example of how to recycle  our water how to recycle our air how to make our  

solar panels more efficient there are places  on the lunar surface which are in 80 sunlight  

so it's a naturally uh good place to start  with a habitation module there and so we're  

going to develop these techniques as we occupy  the moon and we learn more about our environment  

and of course we will necessarily  be exploiting resources on the moon  

you mentioned in your talk the water ice near the  south pole of the moon where we can extract water  

and oxygen not just just to sustain our cells but  for rocket fuel is there a danger that we start to  

over exploit those resources we will certainly  have to manage our exploration of the moon very  

carefully and in a coordinated manner i think  some of the most important things we need  

right now more than the technology that we spoke  about is uh the political framework uh such as  

the united nations in giving us a more up-to-date  outer space treaty that deals with the protection  

of these environments we know that nobody owns  the moon but it's a little bit vague and it can be  

read in different ways by different corporations  different nations commercial entities for example  

so i think we need stronger and clearer regulatory  framework for the use of outer space and for  

this exploration i think that's very important in  order to protect the lunar environment to protect  

mars and to protect other bodies in the solar  system but we i mean we do have time we're not  

suddenly going to see thousands of people going  off to the moon within the next couple of decades  

this is going to take a long period of time  and the initial stages will be very limited  

exploration of the moon because you meant as  you mentioned there it's not just nations it's  

potentially commercial operations does that  bring new challenges that we need to think  

about in terms of regulation in space yeah the  commercial partnership with commercial entities  

uh it brings new challenges but it also brings  incredible new opportunities and actually i i mean  

who hasn't been encouraged by seeing some of  the sustainability that spacex for example have  

managed to achieve with reusing first stage second  stage boosters bringing down the cost of access to  

space and making it a more sustainable project we  already work hand in hand with commercial entities  

for resupply of the space station next year we'll  see two commercial vehicles boeing and spacex  

providing crew to the space station and we're  already working in partnership with commercial  

entities to help build this gateway in orbit  around the moon and to go back to the surface  

of the moon companies like blue origin  as well which are very developed in their  

lunar landing systems uh will be will be  key in working with commercial entities  

so yes challenges but also i think far more than  that greater potential and opportunity because  

it's not just about sustainability i guess there's  already a problem with space debris which is  

only going to get worse you would have thought  with with lots of people competing to put up  

satellites in orbit is to what extent is that our  problem now space debris is a problem now i think  

it's only going to get better actually in terms  of we understand the problem and and everybody  

realizes how valuable space is which means that  everybody wants to protect that environment if  

you're a commercial entity the last thing you  want is your expensive satellite being destroyed  

and clearly if you have humans in space the last  thing you want is a risk of a collision as well  

everybody is working towards minimizing space  debris and identifying techniques for cleaning  

up space and any satellite that goes into orbit in  making sure that we can de-orbit it safely either  

to burn up in the atmosphere or to go far away  from from planet earth so i think the fact that  

we we now have a great understanding of how big  the space debris problem is means that everyone is  

working to reduce that problem another interesting  aspect of the new space age that you mentioned in  

your talk was the psychological aspect if we're  going to the moon and spending a long time there  

or even using that as a stepping stone to mars it  takes eight or nine months to get to mars how do  

we ensure the the psychological robustness and the  cooperation of team members yes so we are going  

to have to be incredibly careful when we select  astronauts for those future missions and that's uh  

something we have been uh working on for many  years in terms of the psychological profiling for  

example uh that we've used to select astronauts  to date um so yes we're gonna have to work very  

carefully on that and once we've selected those  astronauts we need to work equally carefully on  

the training that they receive to prepare them  as well as we can for what they're about to do  

but i certainly believe it is it's within uh human  tolerance both physiologically and psychologically  

to be able to go on a long duration three-year  mission to mars um we've already had a simulation  

of that for example in the mars 500 study  which was done uh outside of moscow uh and  

you know we're learning an awful lot about the  kind of psychological profiling it's going to  

be required for those missions what about i know  this is going way into the future but imagine we  

establish a colony on mars what about  governance there you know if something  

goes wrong and it takes eight nine months  for someone to come out from earth how do we  

ensure that there are robust structures societal  structures i think that's where it comes down  

to again there's conversations we need to have  right now um important conversations about how  

we uh legislate and regularize or regulate sorry  the space environment and uh for example colonies  

on on mars colonies on the moon uh so yeah we  need to certainly before those missions occur  

that needs to be in place have we thought enough  about the psychology even of the remoteness from  

earth i mean you talked about always when you're  on the international space station always having  

the earth there and indeed admiring the earth but  when earth is a barely visible blue dot how does  

that change the psychology of being in space do  you think i think it's going to be um something  

that our future astronauts on these missions  to mars is going to be incredible to actually  

witness the earth disappearing to just a small  speck of light in this in the sky it was i've  

had the pleasure of talking to several apollo  astronauts about that experience of seeing  

the earth disappear to so small it could just be  covered up by a thumb out of the window so i think  

we need to look at uh lessons from the past from  our apollo colleagues and from studies that we've  

been doing uh in order to apply them to the future  of space exploration and really understand that  

environment that future astronauts are going to  need to work in would you yourself want to go to  

the moon or or even mars i would love a mission  to the moon i think i i find that absolutely  

fascinating it's within my career time frame so  there is a possibility of getting that mission um  

i think it will be extremely challenging very  rewarding as well um i think a mission to mars  

uh at the moment i've got two uh young sons and i  think a three-year mission away for any father is  

a long period of time and so i think that you have  a responsibility as a father to be there for your  

children whilst they're growing up once they're at  university and off doing their own thing then who  

knows what sort of time frame do you think we're  talking about of going to mars what's realistic  

i think uh in the next 10 years we are going to  see a settlement on the surface of the moon and  

we're going to see regular uh tours and rotations  of astronauts going to to live and work on the  

moon i think the decade after that is when we'll  start to see mars exploration in terms of firstly  

humans going in orbit around mars and then  landing on the surface so i do think we're  

talking about late the late 2030s into the 2040s  for those first surface landing missions on mars  

50 100 years in the future i think we'll have uh  you know several outposts on the lunar surface i  

think we'll see regular uh missions going  to the moon both commercial and national  

space agencies and i think we'll also have  outposts on mars within a 50 to 100 years time  

uh absolutely and i think we'll also see that  we've cut down our propulsion techniques as  

well it won't it won't be an eight-month journey  in 50 to 100 years time you know we'll probably  

have that down to about two months will we be  coming back to earth or will we be staying away um  

you know yes you can look thousands of years into  the future where there may be civilizations human  

civilizations that don't uh come back to earth but  for right now it's talking about exploration with  

a view to returning to earth is that a reason to  go to space to teach us the value of earth i think  

every astronaut who goes into space does learn the  value of earth and has a different perspective of  

earth it's impossible not to be you know changed  by looking back on your home planet and having a  

fresh appreciation of how tiny uh earth is and  and how vulnerable it looks and how fragile it  

looks in this vast universe so um i think it does  certainly teach us about our place in the universe