![\"A](\"https:\/\/www.nasa.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/03\/thumbnail-juliane-teaching-the-artemis-2-crew-in-preparation-for-their-field-training-in-iceland.jpg\")
<\/a><\/figure>Her multifaceted role includes preparing the Johnson facility that will receive new lunar samples, developing curation strategies, and collaborating with mission teams to plan sampling operations, which encompass collection, handling, transport, and storage processes for all stages of Artemis missions. She trains program managers and engineers on the importance of sample return and teaches crew members how to identify lunar samples and collect them without contamination. She also works with the different programs and teams that oversee the vehicles used at different stages of lunar missions \u2013 collaborating with the human landing system team around tool storage and delivery to the lunar surface, the Orion Program to coordinate sample stowage for the return to Earth, and Exploration Ground Systems to plan sample recovery after splashdown. <\/p>\n<\/p>\n
Once samples are returned to Earth, Gross and the ARES curation team will conduct a preliminary examination of the materials and release a sample catalog from which members of the global scientific community may request loans to carry out their respective research. <\/p>\n<\/p>\n
Working across Artemis teams raised an unexpected but fun challenge for Gross \u2013 learning to communicate effectively with colleagues who have different academic and professional backgrounds. \u201cScientists like me speak a different language than engineers, and we all speak a different language than managers or the general public,\u201d she said. \u201cI have worked hard to find common vocabulary and to \u2018translate\u2019 science needs into the different types of languages that exist within the Artemis campaign. I\u2019m trying to use our differences as strengths to enable mission success and to connect and build relationships with all these different teams through my love and passion for the Moon and rocks from the Moon.\u201d <\/p>\n<\/p>\n
That passion emerged shortly after Gross completed her Ph.D. in geology, while working on lunar samples with the Lunar and Planetary Institute. She went on to become a research scientist with the American Museum of Natural History in New York, and then a tenured professor of planetary sciences at Rutgers University in Piscataway, New Jersey. <\/p>\n<\/p>\n
In 2019, NASA asked Gross to join the Apollo Next Generation Sample Analysis Program. Under the program, NASA preserved some of the 382 kilograms of lunar samples returned by Apollo missions, keeping them sealed for future generations to open and analyze. \u201cNASA had the foresight to understand that technology would evolve and our level of sophistication for handling and examining samples would greatly increase,\u201d Gross said. <\/p>\n<\/p>\n
She and two other scientists had the incredible opportunity to open and examine two samples returned by Apollo 17. Their work served as a practice run for Artemis sample returns while building upon the fundamental insights into the shared origin and history of Earth and the Moon that scientists previously derived from other Apollo samples. For example, the team extracted gas from one sample that will provide information about the volatiles that future lunar missions may encounter around the Moon\u2019s South Pole. <\/p>\n<\/p>\n
\u201cThe Apollo Next Generation Sample Analysis Program linked the first generation of lunar explorers from Apollo with future explorers of the Moon with Artemis,\u201d Gross said. \u201cI\u2019m very proud to have played such an important role in this initiative that now feeds forward to Artemis.\u201d <\/p>\n