Blog: Moon Ahead Full and More

It’s been a little more than three years since NASA’s Artemis I launched in November 2022, but it looks like the Artemis II launch is finally in sight. The agency is planning to roll back the Space Launch System as soon as tomorrow, weather pending, in preparation for the rocket’s April launch window.

With excitement building about the upcoming mission, we thought it would be a great time to resurface our deep dive into the engineering behind getting to the Moon that served as the cover story to Mechanical Engineering’s January 2025 issue. In “Artemis Transcends Apollo,” we investigated how NASA and some of the very same contractors who worked on the Apollo mission—from Boeing to Lockheed Martin to Aerojet Rocketdyne—are getting astronauts back to the Moon.

Since Mechanical Engineering is an exclusive benefit for ASME members, it’s often difficult to share links to our features, but it’s one of the most common requests we receive. So, in addition to unlocking the Artemis feature, we’ve decided to make the entire January 2025 issue free to access for everyone.

There’s far more than just the cover story here. And this time you can share with members and non-members alike. Here’s a brief roundup.

A second feature explores how the steel industry is developing new technologies that will reduce or even eliminate its carbon dioxide emissions. We also spoke with researchers who are developing a Stirling engine for microscale nuclear reactors, extracting lithium from water used in hydraulic fracturing in Appalachia, and testing whether Leonardo da Vinci's famous aerial screw design could be a better propeller for drones.

There are interviews with Ratnak Sok of Waseda University in Tokyo about the future of the internal combustion engine and roboticist Stephen Indyk about creating tools to be used by rovers on Mars, and a piece that explores how athletes learn new skills.

While we do still miss the feel of a print magazine from time to time, the nice thing about having a digital format is that we’re able to create interactive stories that explore topics such as the salary premium engineers get for learning specific skills.

Quizzes are a staple on ASME.org, but we include a beefier version in the magazine. The January 2025 issue’s Big Quiz features 10 questions about the 1960s and 1970s Moon Race. See what you know.

Mechanical Engineering publishes monthly and our March 2026 issue is less than a week away. Our upcoming cover story slides in nicely as the MLB continues with Spring Training. The story examines how engineering comes into play at the ballpark to help players hit farther and fans stay cooler. It’s a fun one that I hope you’ll check out as well.

Louise Poirier is managing editor of Mechanical Engineering magazine.