Artemis

The Artemis program is a human spaceflight program led by NASA to explore the Moon, aiming for its first touchdown on the lunar south pole by 2025. If successful, the Artemis program will perform the first crewed lunar landing mission since Apollo 17 in December 1972, the final lunar flight of the Apollo program. The program is expected to be a multinational collaborative project between governmental space agencies and private spaceflight companies.

The Artemis program began in December 2017 as part of successive efforts to revitalize the U.S. space program. NASA's stated short-term goal for the program is landing the first woman and first person of color on the Moon; mid-term objectives include establishing an international expedition team, and a sustainable human presence on the Moon. Long-term objectives for Artemis are laying the foundations for the extraction of lunar resources, and eventually making crewed missions to Mars and beyond feasible.

The Artemis program is carried out predominantly by NASA and U.S. commercial spaceflight contractors, in partnership with the European Space Agency and the space agencies of several other nations. Other countries have been invited to join the program through signing the governing Artemis Accords, which have remained open for signature since October 2020.