NASA Awards First Prize in Phase 2 of Agency’s LunaRecycle Challenge

NASA News reports that a Massachusetts Institute of Technology team has clinched the top award in Phase two of the agency’s LunaRecycle Challenge. Their project, dubbed CERBERUZ, grinds mixed waste—such as fabrics, plastics, foam and metals—into a fine powder that can be reused as injection‑molded parts or 3D‑printing filament. The student team earned a total of seven hundred seventy‑five thousand dollars and also won the competition’s digital‑twin track, which models the recycling system virtually. The two‑phase, three‑million‑dollar contest, run under NASA’s Centennial Challenges program, aims to create waste‑reduction solutions for lunar and deep‑space missions that could someday benefit life on Earth as well. The prize highlights NASA’s ongoing effort to develop sustainable technologies for future space exploration.

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