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A new project, led by Dr Alessandra Marino, has received a grant with a value of £1.245m from UK Research and Innovation (UKRI) to trial an integrated governance approach to protect the Moon and its sites of interest. MoonRISE: Re‑Imagining Space Environments brings together a range of scholars from different disciplines to answer a pressing question: how do we safeguard the Moon at a time of intensified exploration?

Two new research papers are offering insights into both the search for life beyond the Earth and the future of human activity on the Moon.

Open University researchers are leading international advances in planetary protection, helping ensure that space exploration is safe, sustainable, and scientifically rigorous. Their research is featured in a new thematic issue of Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society A which brings together the latest international perspectives on preventing contamination in space and safeguarding Earth from extraterrestrial material.