NASA further informed that no astronauts were inside the Orion capsule atop the rocket at NASA's Kennedy Space Center. Instead, three test dummies were strapped in for the lunar-orbiting mission, expected to last six weeks.
While the world waits glued to their screen, eager to witness the launch of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) new era of exploration of the moon, let us take a look at the Artemis program and what it aims to do.
What is the Artemis program?
This first flight of the first biology experiment, a 21st century Moon exploration program, conducted by the United States Space agency has named Artemis after Apollo's mythological twin sister.
According to their Twitter bio, NASA aims to ‘land the first woman and first person of color on the Moon’. Artemis is a human and robotic Moon exploration program. If successful, the Artemis program will re-establish human presence on the Moon for the first time since the Apollo 17 mission in 1972.
The 322-foot (98-meter) rocket is the most powerful ever built by NASA, out-muscling even the Saturn V that carried astronauts to the moon a half-century ago.
Landing on moon
If the test goes well, astronauts will follow in the second flight and fly around the moon and back, which is expected to be by 2024. This could be followed by a two-person lunar landing by the end of 2025. NASA has said that they are targeting the Moon's south pole.
During Apollo, 12 astronauts landed on the moon from 1969 through 1972, with stays of no more than a few days. NASA is looking to establish a lunar base during Artemis, with astronauts rotating in and out for weeks at a time. The next step would be Mars, possibly in the late 2030s or early 2040s.
NASA Orion spacecraft's journey
-NASA's Orion spacecraft will launch from Kennedy Space Center on the Space Launch System (SLS) rocket.
-Then Orion will enter orbit around the Earth, at which point it will deploy four solar panels that will provide the spaceship with electricity.
-The upper stage of the SLS rocket will provide Orion with the significant thrust it needs to escape the orbit of Earth and go in the direction of the Moon. About two hours after liftoff, the Orion spacecraft is scheduled to split from the top stage of the SLS rocket.
-The Orion spacecraft will continue its journey to the moon with the assistance of a service module that was supplied by the European Space Agency (ESA).
-The Orion spacecraft will fly around 100 kilometres (about 60 miles) over the surface of the Moon on its closest approach.
-Orion will utilise the Moon's gravity to reach a far-off retrograde orbit around 40,000 miles beyond the Moon.
-The spacecraft will remain in that orbit for more than six days and data, provide the mission controllers at NASA the chance to understand its performance.
-Six days later, the Orion spacecraft will activate its servicing module to come back to Earth. At this point it will again utilise the Moon's gravity to speed up its journey
-A split will occur between Orion's crew module and its service module before the spacecraft returns to Earth.
-When Orion reenters the atmosphere of Earth, the temperature of the spaceship will reach around 5,000 degrees Fahrenheit, and the heat shield will protect the crew module.
-Orion will complete its mission by splashing down in the Pacific Ocean at a safe speed of around 20 miles per hour after being slowed down by parachutes.
The experiment
Also called the BioExpt-1, this is a set of four experiments that will study the effects of space radiation before humans land on Moon and, then further on to Mars.
Scientists are sending not just plant seeds and algae but cellular systems like fungi, and yeast to study radiation effects and how biological systems can adapt and thrive in deep space. They will gather data before and after the flight and analyse the changes to understand what all these biological systems experienced during the flight.
Nasa said that the four bio experiments will be split into two science bags and placed into container assemblies. The experiments will travel along the journey of the Orion spacecraft, the crew module above the Space Launch System, and will go as far as 60,000 kilometers beyond the Moon and return to Earth.
Humans on Moon, Mars- Artemis contribution
Long-range space travel has several effects on the human body and understanding these effects will ensure a better strategy to counter them or minimise them.
"The experiment is called Bio Experiment 1 and it consists of four different experiments that cover four different biological specimens. All of which help us understand how biological systems taken from Earth thrive in space. So we will get a very nice sense of what roughly 42-day mission in this environment with elevated ionising radiation levels and microgravity environment, what it will do the biology," Dr Sharmila Bhattacharya, Nasa's program scientist for space biology said.
