A robotic telescope on the moon could peer deeper into the universe than the famed James Webb Telescope can and perhaps even help find life on exoplanets, scientists say.
Astronomers think that powerful instruments on the moon may open the next frontier in astronomical research, allowing them to study phenomena invisible to existing ground and space-based observatories. Various ideas have been proposed, including supersensitive gravitational wave detectors that could spot more subtle ripples in space-time than Earth-based detectors can and radio telescopes that could take advantage of the moon’s quiet environment to detect signals from the earliest epochs in the universe‘s history.
Another idea, presented by astronomer Jean-Piere Maillard at the recent Astronomy from the Moon conference held by the Royal Society in London, involves placing a 42-foot-wide (13 meters) infrared telescope inside a permanently shadowed crater near one of the moon’s poles.
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