A golden age
With NASA’s Artemis II soon due to launch after a recent delay, space is back in the news. Billionaires and US ventures tend to steal the media limelight, though it seems this truly is a global golden age for space travel. The story of modern spaceflight is no longer just about spectacular launches, it’s centered on institutional permanence. A defining feature of the current era is the construction of parallel infrastructure – lunar programs, space stations, biological research platforms – that edge towards habitation rather than symbolic visitation. Amid these feats of science, engineering, and acts of governmental prowess, this Last Update is bringing together developments that have drifted from orbit and slipped past the headlines.
Lunar ambitions
Mars and asteroid exploration aside, the predominant endeavors are manned missions to the Moon and new space stations. Lunar missions have recently shifted from being sporadic demonstrations to coordinated national roadmaps, with America, China, Russia, India, and Japan all sending landers to the Moon over the last few years. They are also each planning subsequent manned missions in 2028, 2030, between 2030-2040, and in 2040 respectively (two Japanese astronauts are part of the NASA program, with one intended to become the first non-American to walk the surface). This replication is striking. Multiple nations are now building parallel capabilities, rather than pooling resources into a single shared architecture. Whether driven by strategic autonomy, distrust, or scientific policy, such redundancy is rarely accidental.
Power, permanence, and the Outer Space Treaty
Among the primary goals for future Artemis missions are bringing women to the surface and creating the Lunar Gateway – an orbiting space station for docking, refueling, logistics, communication, and research. Moreover, a joint Chinese and Russian venture seeks to build a nuclear power plant on the Moon by 2036, again echoing NASA’s 2030 plan. With energy generation comes the potential for inhabitation, and what these projects share is not solely ambition, it’s permanence.
This expansionism has led many to question the sanctity of space law, and even claims that nuclear bases will be used as safe zones and de facto territory to sidestep potential scrutiny. Crucially, the Outer Space Treaty prohibits national appropriation of celestial bodies, yet it was written in an era before bases and nuclear-powered installations were technically plausible. Reactors, habitats, and logistics hubs can create zones of control and dependency, and this physical presence may shape access even without sovereignty. The question therefore is no longer whether space can be owned, but how influence will be exercised without formal ownership.
India’s cost-effective leap
These plans for the Moon however have yet to reach fruition, though other missions have already had a mixed success. In 2023, the Roscosmos Luna-25 and the Japanese private ispace HAKUTO-R lander each crashed on arrival. In 2024, the Japanese space agency, JAXA, also had an accurate but upside-down landing which halted many of its processes. In contrast, India managed to successfully reach the lunar south pole – and for only around 75 million USD, a fraction of the US equivalent the previous year (albeit with limited hardware). India’s ambitions also extend beyond the lunar surface with a notable plan for their own research station in our thermosphere. Their effort shows that lowered barriers to progress can accelerate competition, while also increasing the number of actors that are pursuing overlapping goals without clear coordination.
End of the international era
India is hardly alone, governments and companies alike have plans for a greater presence in our upper atmosphere. NASA has announced the commercial transition and eventual 2030 deorbiting of the US Orbital Segment of the International Space Station (ISS), which has been active since 1998. Its ten modules will soon be carefully crashed into the Pacific. Equally, the private sector is increasingly becoming more infrastructural rather than spectacular: for instance, NASA has employed SpaceX to deorbit the aging station and Blue Origin to build its Artemis V moon lander. In contrast, Russia had expensive plans to rebuild its ISS Segment, but they later changed dramatically and have been scaled back for a cheaper retrofit. The end of the ISS, a shared platform sustained by geopolitical rivals, signals the fading of a rare global experiment. Its fragmentation likely reflects a broader ongoing realignment of international cooperation.
China’s foothold
Nowhere is a strategy of permanence clearer than within China’s space program. In the shadow of the aging ISS, that cooperative relic of the post-Cold War order, China has methodically assembled its own foothold in low Earth orbit aboard the fully operational Tiangong space station. Maintaining such a presence is not without risk: in 2025, the Shenzhou‑20 return capsule sustained a crack from a suspected debris impact, highlighting a growing problem due to the number of satellites. This delayed the crew’s departure and prompted an unplanned mission to restore a return vehicle. Nearer the end of year, the Shenzhou‑21 mission lifted off for routine crew rotation and in-orbit research. This launch drew only brief media coverage, but it holds notable technical and geopolitical importance.
Among its quieter milestones was the inclusion of Wu Fei, one of China’s youngest taikonauts at just 32. This is an interesting generational signal as much as a technical one. Since Tiangong’s core module entered service in 2021, the China Manned Space Agency (CMSA) has emphasized long-term habitation, regenerative life-support systems, and crew continuity.
Early this year, Xinhua News Agency reported that Tiangong has actively transitioned from construction to a mature “application and development phase,” with expanded extravehicular activities and maintenance operations acting as rehearsals for extended occupancy and research. Next year they also aim to launch a powerful telescope for research into galaxy formation and evolution, and potentially into the currently elusive dark matter and dark energy. The symbolism of these achievements seems understated yet their significance remains.
Life beyond Earth
Equally consequential are the biological experiments unfolding inside Tiangong’s laboratories. Chinese research teams have sent mice into orbit to study the effects of microgravity on bone density, muscle atrophy, and reproduction – having already achieved the first mammalian birth in space. Their work is extending studies previously explored through NASA’s Rodent Research missions aboard the ISS. Notably, peer-reviewed findings show that microgravity rapidly alters skeletal mass, cardiovascular function, and gene expression in mammals. Chinese scientists are now pursuing similar questions within an entirely independent platform, examining whether full reproductive cycles and embryonic development can be sustained in orbit. Ultimately, understanding whether complex life can reproduce beyond Earth is foundational to any serious lunar or Martian strategy.
This technical stability is unfolding against a shifting geopolitical backdrop. Although NASA currently has the advantage on lunar soil, China is making strides across various spheres. Should other countries falter or reframe their plans, Tiangong could become the only crewed space station in low Earth orbit – a subtle but profound shift in symbolic leadership in space.
The race evolved
SpaceX and Blue Origin maintain strong NASA connections, but billionaires and their side projects are obscured by emerging science and governmental one-upmanship. And although the news cycle captures each rocket’s ascent, it often doesn’t dwell on the pattern: generational astronaut recruitment, sustained biological experimentation, and establishing constant habitation. These are not isolated achievements rather cumulative steps. However, there are far fewer international ventures, which hints at a new form of space race where quiet competition drives progress.
Rather than a repetition of the 1960s contest for iconic firsts, the advantage in modern endeavors will go not to the nation that plants a flag, but to the one that sustains infrastructure, trains the next generation of astronauts, and embeds scientific continuity. Some limited cooperation persists, but parallel projects are emerging as the International Space Station reaches the end of its service – signaling a shift from shared orbit towards national and commercial goals. Where once there was an age of collective experimentation; this era is defined by each actor building its own foothold and exercising influence. Setting foot on the Moon is no longer enough, remaining there and discovering a life beyond Earth is the latest target. Here then, we find an evolved space race, advancing not through spectacle, but through endurance and scientific advancement.
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