~) Pergamon Adv. Space Res. Vol. 14, No. 6, pp. (6)205--(6)214, 1994 Copyright © 1994 COSPAR Printed in Great Britain. All dghta reserved. 0273-1177/94 $6.00 + 0.00 A MOON-BASED LABORATORY FOR EXTRATERRESTRIAL SAMPLE ANALYSIS P. Ehrenfreund* and A. Brack** * Service d'Aeronomie, 91371 Verrieres le Buisson, France ** Centre de Biophysique Moleculaire, 45071 Orleans, France ABSTRACT If organic molecules were safely delivered to the early Moon, they may still be present beneath the currently gardened lunar regolith at a depth of 10 m or more. A Moon based laboratory would be helpful to search for organic matter below the surface layers since the problem of terrestrial contamination, which has been a major concern in the past analysis of returned lunar samples, will be overcome. The moon provides also a sterile platform for collection and analysis of individual cosmic dust particles assuming special devices to slowly decelerate the particles allowing a non- destructive capture. INTRODUCTION The unique environment of the Moon offers an ideal platform for a variety of studies. In this paper we want to focus on the investigation of extraterrestrial material on the Moon, in particular to study the role of organic chemical and early biological evolution in the Solar System. We want to give an outline of the major scientific objectives in this field and the techniques required to perform this research IlL Laboratory research carried out on a lunar base will offer a unique possibility to investigate the origin and history of the Moon in order to understand better the early history of the Earth and the conditions which may lead to the origin of life. Exobiological studies that can be carried out uniquely at a lunar base are: the search for organic and biogenic compounds in lunar soil and the study of the frequency history of impacts on the Moon and consequently on the Earth. The lunar environment can be further used to study the survival of terrestrial organisms and even for the direct search for evidence of lifeforms in interplanetary space/2/. Automated surface stations including rover will serve purposes of several disciplines. In the case of exobiology this will include: lunar sample analysis, cosmic dust collection and analysis and various in situ experiments. The majority of life sciences experiments on the Moon will be improved, if human activity is directly involved. THE LUNAR ENVIRONMENT In Fig. 1 the landing sites of various lunar missions are shown. Six Apollo missions returned a total of 382 kg of rocks and soil from the Moon. One of the major goals of the Apollo misslon was to find traces of life on the Moon, but no organic material could be detected. However as can be seen from Fig. 1 the highlands, the far side and the polar regions have not yet been explored. The evolution of the lunar surface in the last 3 billion years has been dominated by external processes, meteorite impacts and the effects of solar wind, solar flares and cosmic rays. Continuous bombardment by meteorites over the whole history of the Moon is responsible for the diminution of the lunar surface rocks and their conversion into a thick dust layer of very different grain sizes. This thick layer of dust, designed as regolith, covers almost the entire surface of the Moon to a depth of at least 5 meters. (6)205