Hacker News Reader

Is there are global policy to introducing foreign life to other planets? Can anyone do anything terraforming or specified introduction they want? It is very likely we can introduce single cell organisms to at least a few planets or moons in the solar system and they would take, if not at the surface but maybe underground.

View on HN

The moon is a category II body, with the only requirement being potential contamination must be documented. This is an area that has been covered by international treaties since the late 60s.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Planetary_protection

Huh? The Wikipedia article you linked puts the moon into

> Unrestricted Category V: “Earth-return missions from bodies deemed by scientific opinion to have no indigenous life forms.”

According that Wikipedia page, COSPAR defined two categorization systems, one for missions, one for celestial bodies.

In their ‘wisdom’, they decided to use Roman numerals I through V for both.

Missions to the moon fall in mission category II, but the moon itself falls in target category V (more precisely unrestricted category V)

Reply on news.ycombinator.com