Human performance under simulated lunar lighting conditions: is it possible to walk on the moon?

Moon colonization has been within our capabilities since the Apollo era. Even though technology maturation has increased this capability and decreased the cost for private firms to potentially colonize the Moon, this has not been developed to date. During the Apollo program, lunar surface operational activities were limited due to luminescence and reflectance lighting issues, which indicate that human body mobility on the Moon may be restricted during extrave-hicular activities. We aimed to examine human performance on a simulated Moon environment during extravehicular activities by identifying visual restrictions that can affect body mobility due to the lunar surface. Within an artificial lunar environment we measured walking time of our participants who completed three walking tasks under lunar simulated continuous light, lunar simulated strobe light and normal electricity Earth light. We found mean differences between walking time with all lighting conditions. We conclude that astronauts may have decreased body mobility during extrave-hicular activities under simulated Moon lighting conditions.