A phone battery can struggle in cold weather. Batteries for future Moon missions face much harder conditions. NASA is developing a new design through a project called SPEARS. It uses solid material where common batteries use liquid. This change could help the batteries work safely across a wider range of temperatures in space.
In tests described on October 14, small cells worked down to minus eighty degrees Celsius. Their performance fell slightly at that temperature. Researchers hope to improve the design further. Future uses could include emergency equipment and vehicles exploring dark areas of the Moon. These are test batteries, not finished products already working on the lunar surface. More development is needed before future missions can depend on them.