The Lunar Dust Challenge: How Simulation + Testing Strengthen Spacesuit Reliability

As NASA’s Artemis program prepares to return humans to the Moon, engineers are shifting their focus from landing safely to performing sustained lunar surface operations.

Teams are designing a new generation of Artemis lunar spacesuits to improve mobility, resist constant exposure to jagged lunar regolith, and support increasingly sophisticated electronics and life-support systems for extended moon missions.

To reduce the risk, Electro Magnetic Applications, Inc. (EMA) is partnering with NASA to evaluate Artemis spacesuit materials and designs by combining physics-based electromagnetic simulation and hands-on testing under lunar-like conditions.

Key takeaways:

• Why the lunar surface demands a new verification approach
• The Apollo dust problem
• How lunar dust becomes electrically charged, and why it threatens spacesuits
• Why lunar regolith requires a simulation-driven approach to spacesuit testing

Environmental Drivers for Spacesuit Design

Captured by the Artemis II crew, the heavily cratered terrain of the eastern edge of the South Pole-Aitken basin is seen with the shadowed terminator – the boundary between lunar day and night – at the top of the image. The South Pole-Aitken basin is the largest and oldest basin on the Moon, providing a glimpse into an ancient geologic history built up over billions of years.

Artemis represents a new phase of lunar exploration, not a return to Apollo. Instead, it establishes a path toward sustained human operations on the lunar surface, with early missions targeting the Moon’s south pole. This shift in mission profile fundamentally changes how engineers design extravehicular activity (EVA) systems, especially lunar spacesuits. Unlike missions in low Earth orbit (LEO) aboard the International Space Station (ISS) or spacecraft operating in geostationary orbit (GEO), Artemis lunar surface operations expose astronauts, and their suits, to a uniquely harsh and coupled environment that cannot be treated as vacuum plus cold.

The Moon lacks a global magnetic field and has only a weak exosphere, forcing astronauts and spacecraft to interact directly with solar wind plasma, ultraviolet (UV) radiation, and energetic particles. Surface missions also require repeated physical contact with lunar terrain, exposure to extreme thermal swings over the lunar day, and long-duration exposure in radiation conditions that differ significantly from orbital regimes. As a result, spacesuit designers must evaluate mechanical systems, materials, and electrical behavior together, not in isolation.

Lunar Regolith and EVA Risk

A close-up view of astronaut Charles Conrad Jr., commander of the Apollo 12 lunar landing mission, photographed during the extravehicular activity (EVA) on the surface of the moon. An EVA checklist is on Conrad’s left wrist. A set of tongs, an Apollo Lunar Hand Tool (ALHT), is held in his right hand. Several footprints can be seen. Astronaut Richard F. Gordon Jr., command module pilot, remained with the Command and Service Modules (CSM) in lunar orbit while astronauts Conrad and Alan L. Bean, lunar module pilot, descended in the LM to explore the moon. Note lunar soil on the suit of Conrad, especially around the knees and below. Courtesy: NASA

Apollo astronauts consistently describe lunar dust as one of the most disruptive aspects of surface operations.

“I think dust is probably one of our greatest inhibitors to a nominal operation on the Moon,” Apollo 17 Commander Gene Cernan said.

Astronaut Eugene A. Cernan, mission commander, walks toward the Lunar Roving Vehicle (LRV) during extravehicular activity (EVA) at the Taurus-Littrow landing site of NASA’s sixth and final Apollo lunar landing mission. The photograph was taken by astronaut Harrison H. Schmitt, lunar module pilot. While astronauts Cernan and Schmitt descended in the Lunar Module (LM) “Challenger” to explore the Taurus-Littrow region of the moon, astronaut Ronald E. Evans, command module pilot, remained with the Command and Service Modules (CSM) “America” in lunar orbit. Courtesy: NASA

Moon dust is a part of the regolith, the loose, unconsolidated layer of material that covers the Moon’s surface. Unlike soil on Earth, lunar regolith did not form through biological or chemical weathering. Instead, it is the result of billions of years of micrometeorite impacts, cosmic radiation, and solar wind bombardment that have shattered surface rocks into fragments ranging from large pebbles down to extremely fine dust. The Moon’s lack of atmosphere and liquid water means this material is continually broken down but never smoothed or redistributed by wind or rain, leaving a surface layer that is both persistent and highly abrasive.

Electrostatic Charging of Lunar Regolith

Lunar regolith accumulates electric charge through the combined effects of solar radiation, interaction with the space plasma environment, and triboelectrification. Because nothing on the lunar surface can be effectively grounded, these charges do not readily dissipate and instead can persist and build over time.

The lunar surface is fully exposed to solar UV radiation and solar wind. Solar UV photons drive photoelectron emission from regolith grains, while surrounding plasma electrons and ions are collected at unequal rates, leading to differential surface charging. Together, these processes generate significant electric potentials on dust particles at the lunar surface.

Electrostatic charging processes on the lunar surface. Solar UV radiation drives photoelectron emission from regolith grains, while unequal collection of ambient plasma electrons and ions produces differential surface charging, resulting in electrically charged lunar dust.

Mechanical interactions further intensify dust charging. As regolith particles repeatedly contact and slide against other materials, most notably spacesuits, triboelectric charge transfer occurs through frictional exchange of electrons. During astronaut operations, this mechanism becomes a dominant contributor to dust charging. When charged particles brush against spacesuit fabrics, joints, or coatings, they exchange charge with suit materials in a polarity-dependent way. This process leaves the dust strongly charged, causing it to adhere electrostatically to the suit rather than behaving like loose, terrestrial soil.

Triboelectric charging at the spacesuit interface. Repeated contact and friction between angular lunar dust and multilayer spacesuit materials drive polarity‑dependent electron transfer, leaving dust particles strongly charged and promoting electrostatic adhesion to suit fabrics, joints, and coatings.

The consequences extend well beyond surface contamination. Electrostatic forces promote adhesion and retention of fine, angular dust within spacesuit components, where abrasive particles increase friction, accelerate wear, and degrade mechanical performance. At the same time, charge accumulation on multilayer suit materials elevates the risk of electrostatic discharge (ESD). Sudden discharges can couple into embedded electronics, threatening communications systems, sensors, and life-support hardware. These hazards scale with mission duration, becoming increasingly severe during long EVAs and repeated surface excursions.

Physics-Driven Verification Strategy

Spacesuits are no longer passive garments but electrically complex systems operating inside a highly charged environment. Managing triboelectrification and surface charging is therefore a systems-level physics problem.

Physical testing alone cannot capture how lunar regolith interacts with these systems across the full range of plasma conditions, material stackups, geometries, and operational scenarios astronauts will encounter on the Moon. Additionally, dust behavior and charge transfer are highly variable and difficult to scale or bound through test campaigns alone.

This is why EMA is taking an analysis-driven approach, pairing physics-based simulation with targeted measurement, to solve the lunar regolith problem. Simulation identifies worst-case conditions, revealing underlying charging mechanisms and guiding where and how testing should be applied, providing a more comprehensive, efficient, and defensible path to reducing risk and ensuring spacesuit reliability in the lunar environment.

Mitigating Lunar Dust Charging Through Simulation

Space capsule simulation as seen in Ansys Charge Plus.

EMA’s analysis-driven approach starts with Ansys Charge Plus simulation. Charge Plus is a software simulation tool for electromagnetic charging and discharging. It is currently the only commercially available software capable of computing these types of space charging problems in 3D due to its ability to model the coupled physics governing plasma interaction, surface charging, charge transport, and ESD in complex, multi-material systems.

In this case Charge Plus will:

• Simulate spacesuit charging from lunar plasma and solar radiation
• Model triboelectric charging from regolith contact and dust adhesion
• Evaluate charge accumulation and transport in multi-layer suit materials
• Identify ESD risk locations that threaten electronics and life-support systems
• Analyze worst-case lunar surface conditions
• Support early design trade studies to reduce risk before hardware is built

Replicating the Space Environment on the Ground

Simulation efforts are paired with test and validation activities at EMA’s Space Environment and Radiation Effects (SERE) Lab, one of the few facilities capable of replicating key aspects of the space plasma environment on the ground. Located in the Berkshire Innovation Center in Pittsfield, Mass., the SERE Lab integrates electromagnetic, radiation, plasma, and UV environments to reproduce the conditions experienced by spacecraft hardware and materials.

EMA’s expert scientists will quantify triboelectric charge transfer using controlled lunar regolith or stimulant reactions, enabling realistic characterization of dust-driven charging effects.

Core parts of the SERE Lab include:

• Main vacuum chamber enabling simultaneous multi-energy exposure with dynamic shuttering to simulate orbital transitions, eclipses, and accelerated lifecycles
• Electron flood sources spanning 500 eV up to 100 keV for surface and internal charging, ESD, and transient arcing studies
• Plasma generation systems reproducing low Earth orbit plasma conditions to study plasma-material and plasma-dielectric interactions
• UV, VUV, and solar simulation sources for accelerated material aging and optical coating, cover glass, and thin films degradation studies
• High-energy radiation sources, including proton accelerators and Sr-90, for radiation induced degradation and charging studies

Space hardware rarely fails due to a single effect. It fails at the intersection of multiple environments, which is exactly what SERE was designed to address.

Designing for Lunar Operations

As the Artemis program returns humans to the Moon, lunar dust emerges as a defining challenge, not a minor inconvenience. Longer missions, increased surface activity, and more complex, tightly integrated systems amplify the risks dust poses to hardware, power, thermal control, and crew safety. Overcoming these challenges will require deeper understanding, predictive modeling, and integrated design approaches, an area where EMA’s combined simulation, testing, and measurement expertise uniquely enables end-to-end solutions.

To understand how integrated Charge Plus simulation and SERE testing can reduce risk for your space mission, connect with EMA today.