a breathtaking tour of humanity’s first space station orbiting the Moon

NASA and its partners are launching Gateway, a space station in lunar orbit, by 2028.

This station will serve as a hub for deep space exploration, equipped with advanced modules for electricity, habitation and science. It will support the Artemis missions with its sophisticated systems, including the power and propulsion element, HALO, and contributions from international agencies such as ESA and JAXA.

NASA, working with international partners, will explore the scientific mysteries of deep space with Gateway, the first human space station to orbit the Moon. Beginning with the Artemis IV mission in 2028, international teams of astronauts living, conducting science, and preparing for missions in the lunar South Pole region on Gateway will be the first humans to set foot in deep space.

This artist’s computer-generated animation presents an exterior tour of Gateway in stunning detail. The gateway elements shown are:

• The power and propulsion element that will make Gateway the most powerful solar-electric spacecraft ever flown. The module will use the Sun’s energy to power the space station’s subsystems and ionize xenon gas to produce the thrust that will maintain Gateway’s unique polar orbit around the Moon.
• HALO (Habitation and Logistics Outpost), Gateway’s command and control system, provides communications between Earth and the lunar surface using the Lunar Link system provided by ESA (European Space Agency). HALO will house life support systems, including exercise equipment and banks of scientific payloads.
• Lunar I-Hab, provided by ESA with material contribution from JAXA (Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency), will host environmental control and life support systems, dormitories and a kitchen, among other features.
• Lunar View, provided by ESA, will have refuelling capabilities for the power and propulsion element, cargo storage space and large windows.
• Crew and science airlock, provided by the UAE’s Mohammad Bin Rashid Space Center, for the transfer of crew and equipment from inside Gateway to the vacuum of space.
• Canadarm3 advanced external robotic system provided by the CSA (Canadian Space Agency).
• Deep Space Logistics spacecraft that will transport cargo to Gateway to support Artemis missions.
• Gateway’s first science payloads will study solar and cosmic radiation, a little-understood phenomenon that is a major concern for people and hardware traveling in deep space, including Mars. The payloads visible in this video are the ESA-provided European Radiation Sensors Array (ERSA) attached to the Power and Propulsion Element, and the NASA-led Heliophysics Environmental and Radiation Measurement Experiment Suite (HERMES) attached to HALO. A third radiation science payload, the ESA-provided Internal Dosimeter Array (IDA) will be inside HALO.

This video also shows:

• The Orion spacecraft docked at the crew and science airlock. Orion will transport international teams of astronauts and three modules (Lunar I-Hab, Lunar View and the crew and science airlock) to the Gateway space station.
• Government-designated Human Landing System (HLS) that will carry astronauts to and from the lunar South Pole region. EspaceX and Blue Origin are under contract to supply the Starship HLS and Blue Moon HLS, respectively.

Gateway is part of the Artemis architecture aimed at returning humans to the lunar surface for scientific discoveries and charting a path for human exploration further into the solar system, such as to Mars and beyond.