Space exploration is about everyone

China's first moon rover, Yutu, or Jade Rabbit, and the lander took photos of each other on the moon's surface Sunday night, a day after the country completed its first lunar soft landing.(Photo/People's Daily Online)

"What's the point of lavishing so large budget on moon landing?" A disagreeable voice asked on China's weibo when the country fell into a celebrative mood after its first ever lunar rover soft-landed on the moon on Saturday night.

What the opponents overlooked is the fact that since 1949, about 80 percent of more than 2,000 new materials coming out in China was initially for the space use.

Couples of new technologies that make China's Chang'e-3 mission possible are expected to cross over into ordinary households and factories.

For example, the materials adopted in mechanical legs and buffers of the lunar rover Yutu (Jade Rabbit), which are light and resistant to impact and large temperature difference on the moon, would certainly have a bright prospect in civilian areas.

The cutting-edge teleoperation, or operation from a distance, which has been proven effective in the rover's image processing, is expected to benefit intelligent robot and automobile manufacturing.

Thanks to the powerful temperature control technology, Yutu is able to function during the cold lunar night when temperatures plunge to minus 120 degrees Celsius.

Although ordinary people needn't to worry about how to keep warm on another planet, some solar water heaters have been equipped with the temperature control technology developed by the aerospace industry to trap heat.

The moon landing of Chang'e-3 paves the way for the next phase of China's lunar mission and the deep space exploration. Chang'e-3 will collect plenty of precious data for China's lunar search and astrophysics, and to a wide extent, will drive the further progresses in various fields such as information technology, intelligent control, material technology, new sensor, new energy transformation and propulsion technology.

The progresses will also prompt the infiltration and convergence of different technologies, and may unleash huge social and economic benefits by exploring a way to a greener development when China is striving to shrug off the energy-consuming growth model.

Space exploration is a consistent commitment, demonstrating novelty and dabbling in wide scientific areas. It matters a lot in terms of the future of China's technology development, productivity and daily life of everyone.