Hey Reader,

Welcome to Mooney Monday, the weekly newsletter from MoonDAO! In this newsletter, we will keep you updated on the latest developments in the world of space exploration and the progress of the MoonDAO community.

MoonDAO Updates

Contribute to DeSci with MoonDAO

Looking for a great way to start contributing to a MoonDAO project, advancing the cause of open science, and earn your first rewards for work done? Get started with the recently approved DeSci Community Validations project (MDP-129).

Community Validations are a DAO-native way to build reputation by validating science in an open and transparent fashion. MoonDAO members can easily contribute, get credited, and receive rewards for their contributions to a collection of DeSci Nodes. Members can contribute by publishing and submitting research for curation, or by validating and curating submitted work.

The unified, open and decentralized infrastructure underpinning Community Validations ensures that contributions can build into a collective reputation over time, helping showcase both the individual work of a contributor and the collective efforts of a DAO.

MoonDAO has allocated 1ETH to reward authors and validators for their contributions, as well as quarterly $MOONEY and potential retroactive rewards.

​Read more about how you can help the Community Validations project or reach out to Phil on Discord to answer any questions you might have about getting involved.

MoonDAO Live Tomorrow

🎧 Join Us Live!​

Tomorrow on MoonDAO Live, we’ll be joined by astrophysicist Dr. Jonathan McDowell. Jonathan is based at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

As part of the team at the Chandra X-ray Center, he dives into the mysteries of black holes, quasars, and X-ray sources within galaxies. Not only does he explore the depths of the universe, but he also crafts data analysis software to aid the X-ray astronomy community. Check out Jonathan's website Planet 4589.

Have any questions for Jonathan? Let us know on X. ​

ETH Denver

At ETH Denver, MoonDAO made a significant impact with the presence of executive team members, Pablo and Mitchie, alongside active community members at one of the Ethereum ecosystem’s largest annual events.

Some of the highlights included Manuel's talk on the future of space and web3, showcasing MoonDAO's vision and initiatives, as well as deep learning and synchronization with the Juicebox team (where MoonDAO did the initial crowd fundraising), shedding light on future plans with some profound implications for MoonDAO's upcoming DePrize model. This model marks a critical turning point in the evolution of MoonDAO's funding model, poised to revolutionize collaboration towards groundbreaking initiatives.

Additionally, new developments in our entity registration project garnered attention from MIDAO and DARPA, underscoring the innovative strides MoonDAO is making. The team also took the opportunity to share and celebrate the success of the ZeroG event, further cementing MoonDAO's influential presence at ETH Denver.

Bite-Sized Space News

Crew 8 Launch

After a Friday postponement and a Saturday night scrub, the Crew-8 team launched late Sunday night on a Falcon 9 rocket from Kennedy Space Center to the International Space Station. Saturday night's unsuccessful launch attempt was postponed "due to unfavorable conditions in the flight path of the SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket and Dragon spacecraft."

The Crew-8 launch carried NASA astronauts Matthew Dominick, Michael Barratt, and Jeanette Epps, as well as Roscosmos cosmonaut Alexander Grebenkin to the orbital laboratory. The targeted docking time is about 3 a.m. on Tuesday.

This launch is one of a myriad of crewed flights scheduled for this year, including the Axiom AX-3 mission earlier this year, an upcoming demo flight for Boeing's Starliner, the Polaris Dawn mission, and, in about six months' time, the Crew-9 launch, to name a few

We’ve got a lot to look forward to this year in human spaceflight!

Starship Wet Dress Rehearsal

SpaceX's next Starship, poised for its third launch attempt, successfully completed a crucial fueling test and wet dress rehearsal yesterday, marking an important milestone toward an impending launch for the world's largest rocket's journey. The stainless-steel behemoth, comprising the Starship rocket and its Super Heavy booster, underwent a rehearsal at SpaceX's Starbase near Boca Chica Beach, Texas, where it was filled with over 10 million pounds of liquid methane and oxygen propellant.

Despite setbacks from previous tests, including explosions (RUDs) and technical challenges, SpaceX continues advancing its Starship program, with the third flight awaiting FAA clearance. Recent investigations have highlighted areas for improvement, leading to hardware and operational enhancements aimed at ensuring the safety and reliability of future missions. As SpaceX continues to push the boundaries of space travel, the space community eagerly awaits the next milestone in this groundbreaking journey. We are coming close to a third orbital launch attempt for this ambitious next generation vehicle.

Speaking of monumental new rockets, Blue Origin's New Glenn was also spotted as it rolled out to the pad and raised vertically at Cape Canaveral in Florida which was the first view of the advanced heavy-lift vehicle that is set to launch sometime this year.

Good Night, Odysseus

With the Sun no longer illuminating the panel that was keeping Odysseus alive in its fallen position on the Moon, Intuitive Machines put the spacecraft in sleep mode on February 29. Before its power was depleted, Odysseus completed a final farewell transmission with this photo of the Moon.

Despite experiencing a landing mishap that left the spacecraft sideways, the mission has been deemd an “unqualified success” by both NASA and Intuitive Machines, one that “met very high level mission objectives to touch down softly on the Moon—softly and safely—and return scientific data.”

The Nova-C lander, named Odysseus, delivered scientific data from nearly all payloads after touching down near the moon's south polar regions. While the landing was not as soft as hoped due to issues with laser rangefinders, the mission accomplished these key objectives.

Upcoming Launches

• SpaceX Falcon 9 | Transporter 10 on Mon Mar 4, 2024 5:05 PM EST from SLC-4E, Vandenberg SFB, California, USA
• SpaceX Falcon 9 | Starlink Group 6-41 on Mon Mar 4, 2024 6:56 PM EST from SLC-40, Cape Canaveral SFS, Florida, USA
• Space One KAIROS Maiden Flight on Fri Mar 8, 2024 9:00 PM EST from Space Port Kii, Japan

That’s it for your MoonDAO updates this week. Join us on Discord to stay up-to-date with all the latest developments.