The PR auction in Boston, USA, recently auctioned 3 dead cockroaches, the final auction price is expected to be 400,000 US dollars, everyone is very interested in such a high value of cockroaches, just when the time to go on NASA suddenly called off this auction, because NASA wants to get back these 3 cockroaches, what is the special beginning of the dead cockroaches that were auctioned?
The cockroaches themselves are nothing, and the food is more special
Cockroaches are the most common creatures on Earth, humans live everywhere, these 3 dead cockroaches are special because they are experimental cockroaches, the story also begins with the first time humans landed on the moon, Armstrong is the first astronaut to land on the moon, he made human history, and Armstrong returned to Earth with 47 pounds of lunar soil.
There are 4.5 pounds of lunar soil assigned to the U.S. laboratory, chaired by Brooks, a professor of entomology at the University of Minnesota, mainly to study the composition of the lunar soil and whether it is harmful to life on Earth, one of which is used to raise these 3 cockroaches, so there is a reason why these 3 cockroaches are as high as $400,000, because the lunar soil is very precious.
Why did NASA call off this auction?
Brooks did not find that lunar dust was poisonous to cockroaches after research, and published the article in 1969, while Professor Brooks did not return the experimental materials to NASA at that time, more than 40 years later Professor Brooks died, in 2010 his daughter got the experimental materials, and the auction was held in 2022.
NASA sent an email to the auction house saying that the sale of experimental materials was improper and illegal, and that "no one, university, or other entity was ever allowed to save samples from the Apollo mission!" ”。
NASA is very cautious externally and sloppy internally
It should be known that since the success of the Apollo mission, NASA's control of lunar soil has been very strict, especially for other countries (the United States gave China 1 gram of lunar soil more than 40 years ago), but NASA's internal control of these experimental materials is very loose, because there is no clear tracking, many related items are lost, such as the bag that Armstrong used to collect lunar rock samples and the cockroach experimental material this time.
Summary: At present, only two countries in the world have obtained lunar soil, one is the United States, the other is China, the lunar soil has a very high research value, which is also a reason for NASA to stop the auction, with the development of continental space technology, everyone does not have to envy others, because the mainland also has enough experimental materials!