All 12 Nasa astronauts who landed on the moon during a total of six Apollo missions from 1969 to 1972 were white men.

The suits will serve a crucial role in NASA’s Artemis program, which seeks to return astronauts to the lunar surface later this decade on a mission dubbed Artemis III. After astronauts land at the lunar south pole, the spacesuits will serve as mobile life support, allowing them to explore the lunar terrain on foot.

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That flight, if successful, will pave the way for a planned Artemis 3 astronaut expedition to the lunar surface - the first ever to the moon’s south pole - later in the decade. It will be the first ever to send a woman to walk on the moon. The program, named for Apollo’s twin sister from Greek mythology, is aimed ultimately at establishing a sustainable lunar base as a stepping stone to future human exploration of Mars. The design of the spacesuits borrows from NASA’s own research. The space agency had previously unveiled a prototype design for lunar spacesuits in 2019, called xEMU.

The new suit allows for more range of motion and flexibility and its design can accommodate at least 90% of the US male and female population, according to NASA. Axiom Space will develop, certify and produce the spacesuits and the company will “test the suit in a spacelike environment prior to the mission.” Developing new spacesuits capable of keeping astronauts alive on the moon has been a years-long effort at NASA. At one point in 2021, the space agency’s inspector general, Paul Martin, warned that significant delays in bringing new spacesuits to fruition would quash NASA’s goal of getting humans to the moon by 2024. The space agency has already delayed the crewed lunar landing to no earlier than 2025. Branded by Axiom as the “Axiom Extravehicular Mobility Unit,” or AxEMU for short, the new suits are more streamlined and flexible than the old Apollo suits, with greater range of motion and variability in size and fit.

The precise look of the suits, however, remained a closely guarded trade secret. Those on display came with an outer layer that was charcoal gray with dashes of orange and blue and Axiom’s logo on the chest – intended to obscure Axiom’s proprietary outer fabric design. This is this is a great example of what innovation can do,” said Peggy Whitson, retired NASA astronaut and current Axiom astronaut. “This is going to be such a much more flexible suit and the range of motion is really going to improve the astronauts’ ability to do all those tasks that they’re going to do while they’re out exploring on the lunar surface and eventually on Mars.” We have not had a new suit since the suits that we designed for the space shuttle and those suits are currently in use on the space station,” said Vanessa Wyche, director of NASA’s Johnson Space Center. “So for 40 years, we’ve been using the same suit based on that technology. And now today, Axiom is going to innovate. We’re going to provide (access to) all of our facilities and we will be working together to make sure that we have a safe suit that performs and everything that our astronauts use for doing surface operations.”

They are designed to fit a broad range of potential wearers, accommodating at least 90% of the US male and female population, Nasa said. They also will incorporate advances in life-support systems, pressure garments and avionics.Nasa promises that subsequent Artemis missions will include the first person of colour on the moon. Axiom Space, which holds the contract to develop spacesuits for NASA's Artemis Program, included its logo and company colors on a top cover over the spacesuits. Axiom Space