NASA’s ‘coolest’ challenge: 12 student teams picked to crack space fuel storage

NASA has chosen 12 university teams as finalists in the 2025 Human Lander Challenge, a competition focused on designing advanced systems for storing and transferring super-cold cryogenic propellants—like liquid hydrogen and oxygen—essential for future Moon and Mars missions.

Now in its second year, the challenge is part of NASA’s efforts to develop the Artemis program and beyond. Cryogenic fluids must be kept ultra-cold to remain liquid, but current tech only supports short-term storage. Future missions will require solutions that work for weeks or even months.

Each finalist team has received $9,250 to refine their concepts. Their proposals include novel cooling mechanisms, fuel transfer tech, and innovative containment systems for space use.

Selected universities include MIT, Texas A&M, Colorado School of Mines, Ohio State, and others, with projects like ECLIPSE, THERMOSPRING, AMCC-AAC, and CRYPRESS.

Teams will submit detailed technical papers and present to NASA and industry experts in June 2025 in Huntsville, Alabama. The top three entries will share a $18,000 prize.

NASA’s Tiffany Russell Lockett highlighted the initiative’s dual role: pushing forward spaceflight technologies and shaping the “Artemis Generation” of engineers.

The Human Lander Challenge is sponsored by NASA’s Human Landing System Program and managed by the National Institute of Aerospace.

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