A second #LPSC NASA briefing today dealt mostly with planetary science funding details: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N8-enBzNwlo
Plenary Session: R&A Town Hall

YouTube
Also from the #LPSC #NASA HQ Briefing: the science riding along on #ArtemisII - I think "verbal descriptions" of the Moon haven't been defined science objectives since the Apollo days.
From the #LPSC #NASA HQ Briefing: the four American robotic #Moon landings planned for this year - the Blue Origin HLS demonstrator for #Artemis should go first, as early as next month. (There is a little #VIPER looking at the latter because this homeless rover might fly on a second demonstrator - if they can figure out how to get it from the 8 meters high lander to the surface.)
... I show the new thing: the LEV-1 hopping rover for SLIM, rover turning marks at Chandrayaan 3, a row of bounce pits for Chandrayaan 2, the remarkable footpad gouges at IM-2 Athena's site. I point out that the new imaging service from Firefly, Ocula, will equal this and we need to get those images into PDS. Later I will give a link to the full size poster.
#moon #OHRC #LRO #LPSC
Slight change of plan - tomorrow the lunar site selection begins. Today, a preview of my LPSC poster. I compare LROC-NAC and OHRC images of some landing sites - OHRC has 4x the resolution of typical LROC-NAC images at the moment. At first NAC had a resolution of 50 cm/pixel from 50 km but now it is at 100 km the resolution is about 1 m/pixel, worse at slant range very near the pole. So OHRC gives more detail, and where it shows something significant...
#moon #OHRC #LRO #LPSC

The number of abstracts submitted to the Lunar and Planetary Science Conference (#LPSC) this year is down by almost 50% when compared to normal years.

It's hard to say what is the main cause, but big factors are Europeans who don't want to travel to the US, reductions of US research budgets, censorship of abstracts, and just your average hatred of Texas.

(Image posted by Michael Aye on the @openplanetary Slack).

If you are unhappy about the decision by LPI/USRA to censor #LPSC abstracts, please consider signing this open letter:

https://signatories.planetary-research.org/dont-censor-LPSC-letter

Open letter - Denouncing LPI's Censorship of LPSC Abstracts

Should #LPI and #USRA restore all censored abstracts? Should they commit to preserving scientific freedom of speech at #LPSC? And should they commit to not censoring #LPSC2026 submissions?

If the answer is yes, then sign this petition!

https://forms.gle/G1yAxZqmDujbVDHR7

Why I will be boycotting meetings sponsored by the Lunar and Planetary Institute.

An open letter to the LPI executive board

#LPI #USRA #LPSC #BoycottLPSC #BoycottLPI #PlanetaryScience