Fleet Space Receives Moon To Mars Grant to Advance Off-World Gravity Sensing Technology

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Fleet Space, Australia’s leading space exploration company, today announced the award of a Moon to Mars supply chain grant from the Australian Government to develop advanced gravity sensing capabilities to accelerate and optimise in-situ resource exploration on the Moon and Mars. The gravity sensor prototype will be developed as part of the Australian Space Agency’s Moon to Mars Supply Chain Capability Improvement Program to build critical technological capabilities in support of future missions to new worlds. 

“Earth urgently needs next-generation, off-world exploration technologies to maximise the value of every mission to the Moon and Mars over the coming years,” said Co-Founder & Chief Exploration Officer, Matt Pearson. “A vital part of optimising the ROI of every un-manned or manned mission depends on miniaturised, rapidly deployable, and highly scalable exploration technologies that can rapidly gather high-quality subsurface data from the landing site to identify and build a viable base of operations.”

Gravity sensors are compact, high-precision devices based on Micro-Electro-Mechanical Systems (MEMS) technology used to measure variations in gravitational acceleration. By measuring these subtle variations, these new sensors will enable gravity field mapping of planetary surfaces to deliver invaluable insight about the density of underlying geological formations and subsurface composition. This includes identifying the location of subsurface features like water reservoirs, mineral deposits, and other structural weaknesses, such as caves, lava tubes, or fault lines -  a critical process for de-risking landing site selection, rover navigation, and future infrastructure development. As an example of this process using a different method, check out how Fleet Space’s ExoSphere technology was used to deliver real-time 3D imaging of lava tubes in the Canary Islands in collaboration with MIT Media Lab’s Space Exploration Initiative (full project details available here). 

“Leveraging Fleet Space’s terrestrial end-to-end mineral exploration platform, ExoSphere, as a blueprint - we have created a model for a hyper-scalable, off-world exploration system designed to operate at the planetary level,” added Mr. Pearson. “As we venture deeper into our solar system, the essential toolkit of exploration technologies must be integrated into a single system to streamline deployment, reduce costs, optimise mission planning, and enhance off-world decision making for the success and safety of all future explorers of new worlds.”

The development of an advanced MEMS gravity sensor prototype is the next step following Fleet Space’s creation of a lunar variant of the smart seismic sensors enabling ExoSphere’s real-time 3D imaging capabilities - used by global mining leaders like Rio Tinto, Barrick, and Gold Fields, among many others - on Earth. Planned for deployment on Firefly Aerospace’s second Blue Ghost mission in 2026, Fleet Space’s miniaturised smart seismic station - SPIDER - will be deployed by the Blue Ghost lunar lander on the Moon to unlock new insights about the composition of the lunar subsurface. Fleet Space’s MEMS gravity sensors have set the potential for a similar trajectory into motion, demonstrating a path to radically simplify and accelerate the collection of high-quality gravity data on Earth and beyond. 

Blue Ghost Lunar Lander | Image Credit: Firefly Aerospace

Building on the rapid adoption of ExoSphere by the global mining sector to accelerate priority exploration projects across five continents  - Fleet Space closed a USD$100M Series D with a valuation of USD$525M in December to further expand the end-to-end capabilities of the platform. To increase capacity of its proprietary exploration satellite network in LEO to support the expansion, Fleet Space launched its most advanced Centauri 7 and Centauri 8 models on SpaceX’s Transporter 12 mission.