NOVEL METALLURGICAL PATHWAYS FOR METAL AND OXIDE EXTRACTION FROM LUNAR REGOLITH

In-Situ Resource Utilization (ISRU) of water assets from the lunar surface, especially from the volatile-rich polar regions, is a topic of significant current research. However, the term ISRU can encompass a much wider variety of potential resources and relevant extraction technologies. In a novel approach, rather than treating an extra-terrestrial feedstock using existing terrestrial methods of metal extraction, we have focused on exploiting …