Pooping on the Moon Is a Messy Business

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The Apollo crews left a total of 96 bags of waste, including urine and feces, across their six landing sites, which are still sitting there to this day: a celestial reminder that wherever humans go, we bring our shit with us...

These Apollo jettison bags, sometimes shorthanded as the poo bags, have been the subject of much interest and speculation since they were deposited on the moon more than 50 years ago..

Basically, in space a human no longer has gravity to assist pulling the feces away from the anus, explains David Munns, a professor of the history of science and technology at John Jay College, City University of New York, who recently coauthored a book about waste management in space with Krin Nickelsen, a professor at Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich..

The waste management designs are still under review, but NASAs aim is to minimize any potential impacts to the lunar surface, says Michael Rapley, Human Landing System crew compartment deputy manager at NASAs Johnson Space Center...

One of the key challenges for NASA and its Artemis partners during these next generation lunar missions is developing a waste management system which can not only successfully collect waste in a weightlessness environment, like on the International Space Station in low Earth orbit, but also in one-sixth gravity while on the lunar surface...

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