- NASA patented an efficient new trajectory for sending smaller robotic spacecraft to the moon.
- The agency says it patents and licenses technologies to ensure they can achieve the "widest distribution" possible.
- The new trajectory may help a planned spacecraft called the Dark Ages Polarimeter Pathfinder reach lunar orbit and repeatedly fly through a "cone of silence" on the far side of the moon.
- That spacecraft could detect signals from the first atoms, stars, galaxies, black holes, dark matter, and more, leading to big discoveries about how the universe evolved.
Business Insider original title is an insane #clickbait
"NASA patented a faster, cheaper route to the moon. The first spacecraft to use it could make Nobel Prize-winning discoveries about the universe."
Yet it remains interesting to learn about patenting trajectories, hiding microwave-oven sized satellites on the other side of the moon, and observing deep space / far time from a "cone of silence"