 Good afternoon, terrestrial life forms. Thank you, and visitors. Thank you, and visitors. Thank you for having me today. My name is Matt Daniels. I am an Assistant Director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, the Origins, or OSTP. The Origins of OSTP date to the President's Science Advisory Council, which was brought into the White House by President Eisenhower to advise on managing a world with nuclear weapons. And scientific advisors to the President have existed since that time in various forms. OSTP is the modern version of that organization. Our mission includes advising the US President on matters related to science and technology, creating bold new visions, wise policies, and effective and equitable programs for science and technology, and engaging with outside organizations, including other nations, scientific organizations, and civil society. In support of this mission, in November of this past fall, OSTP released the first ever White House CIS Lunar Strategy, a national CIS Lunar Science and Technology Strategy. This strategy notes that the moon itself and the regions of space around the moon are still largely unexplored. And the strategy addresses how the United States will support responsible, sustainable, and peaceful exploration in this region of space. So for the purposes of this strategy, CIS Lunar, this funny word that has been used for decades and means has a somewhat shifting meaning sometimes, we had to create a particular meaning for this strategy. Technically, the word CIS Lunar means everything within the moon's orbital radius. That's not a very helpful definition here, because that would mean that low Earth orbit is in CIS Lunar space. That's not very helpful for us when we talk about this here. So we want to talk about the region beyond geosynchronous orbit, but still in the Earth-moon system, including the moon. And that's what I'll be talking about when I refer to CIS Lunar. As the United States prepares to resume human lunar exploration, we remain committed to demonstrating how CIS Lunar activities can be carried out for the benefit of and in the interests of all nations, while enhancing transparency and building confidence and cooperation among moon-faring entities. The CIS Lunar strategy addresses how U.S. science and technology leadership will support responsible, peaceful, and sustainable exploration and growth in this region of space. Our approach emphasizes the critical importance that we place on the Outer Space Treaty. A strategy like this, in particular from my organization, allows us to coordinate and focus science and technology activities across the United States government. This is, first and foremost, talking to science and technology organizations within the United States and then especially within the United States government. So before we go into the details of the CIS Lunar strategy itself, I want to talk briefly about the importance of this topic. I was told I have two buttons here, one advances slides and one blinds the audience with a laser. So I'm gonna try to continually push the right button. I'll aim at the desk while I do. Success so far. The decade ahead is tremendously important for this region of space. Human activity in CIS Lunar space is expected to grow significantly over just the next decade. Multiple countries, including both governments and private entities, are expressing interest in going to the moon. The counts of the quantity of missions going into this region of space vary a great deal right now, but many have a range on the order of 100 to 150 missions to the moon or CIS Lunar space just in the next decade. So this is a new situation for us. This is a wide part of the world is expressing interest in going to the moon, interest and hopes and plans to go to the moon. A subset of that, a subset of those countries is expressing a credible intent to remain or create the beginning of an enduring presence at the moon. And space-faring nations will begin to set important new precedents across the next decade. So this decade is particularly important. In this context, overall the United States sees this as an era of opportunity and we are approaching this most of all in that spirit. CIS Lunar space offers tremendous promise for advancing science, technology and exploration. Our activities at the moon remain uniquely inspiring for societies around the planet. This is opportunities for advancing our knowledge of some of the most important questions in planetary science. It's a valuable region for learning how to have human expeditions into deep space and extending human spaceflight into the rest of the solar system. And much of our exploration efforts in the United States in this region of space in the early years will center on Artemis missions, which we are advancing with many international partners, some of which are in the room here today. But our national strategy recognizes priorities for science and technology organizations across the United States government. For example, one of the most interesting parts of this process for me was when we brought everyone to the table, the National Science Foundation came forward and one of their first priorities when they came to the table with the rest of the United States government was we have to protect and preserve the radio quiet environment in the shielded zone of the moon. This is tremendously important to the future of radio astronomy and even SETI. And that is something that we have to take care of over the longer term. That is why sustainable is one of the three principles that I started with. And if we even wanted to extend this thinking, you could actually think of this as something analogous to a conservation of natural heritage in a very new way and in a very new place. So as we developed the strategy, we were conscious especially of three historic analogs. And I would be the first to say, if I can find a parallel to the ancient Mediterranean or the Roman Empire, I'll be the first to try to find such historical analogs or metaphors. We ended up centering though on actually recent history, three areas mostly in the 20th century, a little bit of the 19th century that we recurrently found had resonance for our current moment and the decade ahead or so. One is the beginning of spaceflight, the Eisenhower years of activities in outer space. This was a period when precedence mattered disproportionately. When we think about what are our first steps and how do we describe them and what precedence do we create for the longer term? The second example is Antarctica and actually the long history of Antarctica. Most people in, at least in the American space community when we think about the moon and Antarctica, most people jump right to the era of the Antarctic Treaty system. There was a long history of human activities at Antarctica before the Antarctic Treaty system and we were conscious of that entire history and wanting to learn from that history. So in this case, imagine we have to think about international relations with respect to a place and we want to think about how we foster peace for the long term. We also thought about the history of the International Geophysical Year, which actually began in a living room outside Washington DC with discussion about a new international polar year and opening a new era of polar exploration where many more people could participate and many more kinds of organizations would be involved and we thought about that kind of legacy. And the third example, the third historical analog was actually technological infrastructure. So if we think about the number of times now where we have had even early prototypes of technological infrastructure or systems that we thought of as R&D systems or experimental systems that took on a great importance and an enduring quality and became something that was used for the long term and that many people come to rely on. Think of GPS, think of ARPANET, which I've shown here. If you go back further in time, think of the standardization of time in North America so trains could coordinate and run together on tracks. We should think early about longer term futures in this region of space and use that foresight to inform the technological rootstock that we create today. As we begin to create infrastructure in this region of space, we should think ahead to ensure that we do so responsibly and with this farsighted vision. So the decade ahead is tremendously important. It is not too early to begin thinking about all of these things together. As General Shaw said, we have an opportunity to learn from history and to set out to do better in a new region of space. And most of all, by approaching this topic early, we can approach everything with a sense of optimism. We can anticipate and solve problems. We can build new international cooperation and we can envision and build positive futures. So in this strategy, US Science and Technology Leadership, as I've been describing, will support the responsible, peaceful and sustainable exploration and use of CIS lunar space, including the moon, by all space-faring nations and entities. We recognize that having this leadership have an enduring quality and be sustainable requires fostering scientific discovery, economic development and international cooperation. The CIS lunar strategy organizes US Federal Science and Technology activities into four objectives. I'm gonna talk briefly through each one. I'm gonna talk increasingly quickly. The timer is blinking red at me, so I'll talk fast. The first one is research and development to enable future growth in this region of space. This includes things that the science community and the space community is long familiar with. So this is technologies to mitigate the negative effects of the space environment on humans. This is especially important as humans expand beyond the Van Ellen belts over the years ahead. But it also includes social science. The CIS lunar strategy actually notes that we, the United States government, will support social science related to crude exploration and permanent inhabitation of deep space. Many unresolved issues regarding space exploration cannot be solved through engineering alone, such as the guiding ethics of expansion into space, long-term cooperative models for space development and even equitable governance structures for space communities. And so the strategy continues the United States will enable and support research in the social sciences to advance our understanding of these issues. And this research will encourage the scientific community and the wider public to think more deeply about humanity's long-term future in space. Our second objective that we organize around of four is international cooperation and expanding international cooperation. I would say that the United States, I'm gonna be abridging a little bit to go a little bit faster before I'm yanked off the stage, but the US is committed to demonstrating how CIS lunar activities can be carried out for the benefit of and in the interests of all nations while enhancing transparency and building confidence and cooperation among moon faring entities. As an example, international cooperation done in a manner consistent with the Artemis Accords adheres to these principles. We welcome additional countries joining the Artemis Accords to demonstrate their commitment to these principles as well. To help further achieve this objective on international cooperation, the United States encourages the scientific community to consider the merits of establishing an international lunar year or ILY. This ILY could be modeled on or billed upon the historic examples of international polar years in the international geophysical year. This region of space will be remembered as opening up during a period of increasing geopolitical tensions. The international scientific community and scientists globally recognize that science is an international enterprise and scientists have long demonstrated the ability to work across boundaries for the common good. An international lunar year, especially in this decade, can demonstrate how lunar activities can be carried out responsibly and for the benefit and interests of all nations while enhancing transparency and building confidence and cooperation among moon-faring entities. An international lunar year can also embody and exemplify the principles of the outer space treaty and the Artemis Accords. Hello. The third is expanding space situational awareness into cis-lunar space. I'll simply note that SSA capabilities are the foundation of responsible behaviors. We have to know what's going on. We anticipate, as we currently do in nearer space, sharing SSA data globally in this new region of space. Fourth and finally is implementing communications and position navigation and time capabilities, essentially information infrastructure, which is the foundational set of infrastructure that all operators will need in this region of space, ensuring that U.S. capabilities are scalable and interoperable. Essentially, you could say this is an example of why we have a cis-lunar strategy and not just a lunar strategy or moon strategy. We can think about this region of space together and we can think about, for example, how information infrastructure in space by communications and PNT capabilities can enable safe and sustainable activities in space, on the lunar surface, and transiting between destinations. Importantly, also with these capabilities, the United States can open new pathways into this region of space for new space-faring actors going to the moon. By doing so, we can bolster a future ecosystem that is safe and responsible and explored by rule-following actors. Said another way, we can, through our existing programs, help make the moon more accessible to more of humanity. I will close by saying that this is a beginning of a longer talk. This is the beginning of an exciting time for us in space. We will have many NASA activities on the moon, around the moon, and in the vicinity of the moon in the decade ahead. But we will also have a worldwide network of allies and partners increasingly working and exploring with us at the moon. And as I have said, with these approaches, the United States can help open new pathways for others to work with us in cis-lunar space and at the moon. Or said another way, our activities can make the moon and cis-lunar space more accessible to more of humanity. Our activities at the moon and beyond can cause individuals and nations and governments to view the Earth through a new lens, just as our Vista from Apollo 8 fostered new thinking about planet Earth and its future. Our national cis-lunar science and technology strategy is designed to be a first step in this process. Arthur C. Clark would say that most of our future is still ahead of us. Together, we are going to be building a new sphere of human activity and we're going from there into the solar system. There is so much to do and so many exciting possibilities ahead. Thank you.