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Australians began voting Monday on a name for the country’s first home-made moon rover, with a shortlist including “Mateship”, “Roo-ver” and “Kakirra”\u2014an Indigenous word for the Earth’s satellite.<\/p>\n
Australia’s space industry will develop the semi-autonomous rover to collect lunar soil under an agreement signed two years ago with NASA, which plans to fly it to the moon’s surface as soon as 2026.\n<\/p>\n
NASA will then attempt to extract oxygen from the soil sample, marking “a key step towards a sustainable human presence on the moon”, the Australian Space Agency said in a statement.\n<\/p>\n
Two Australian consortiums, AROSE and ELO2, are working on rover concepts, one of which will be selected to design and develop the final rover.\n<\/p>\n
The agency said it had asked thousands of people and schools to take part in a contest to come up with the best name for the future moon vehicle, whittling them down to a shortlist of four names.\n<\/p>\n
They were “Mateship”, “Roo-ver”, “Kakirra” and “Coolamon”\u2014an Aboriginal wooden dish with curved sides used for various tasks including carrying food and cradling babies.\n<\/p>\n
Online voting opened to the public Monday, with the winning name to be announced December 6.<\/p>\n
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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tAustralians vote on name for home-made moon rover (2023, November 20)
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