Nvidia sends GPUs to the Moon

Lunar Outpost, a startup building robotics for space infrastructure, announced that its next moon rover will use Nvidia Jetson chips to control its lidar system, likely making it the first GPU on the lunar surface. The company is comparing the Jetson platform to its existing flight compute system to see if the more capable GPU-powered systems can survive the extreme environment of the Moon, including radiation and temperature swings. NASA is funding private companies to explore the Moon ahead of returning astronauts, possibly by 2028. Nvidia also recently partnered with Firefly Aerospace to use the Jetson platform on a satellite orbiting the Moon for imagery processing. Lunar Outpost’s rover will be carried by a lander built by Intuitive Machines, and the missions are expected to launch on Falcon 9 rockets before the end of the year. The company has several smaller autonomous rovers planned, plus a larger one called Pegasus intended to carry astronauts, but that mission depends on Blue Origin’s rocket which suffered an anomaly.