From Jingbo Lake to Lunar Caves: China’s Quiet Exploration Ambition

At the edges of what we can see, the darkness often holds answers. In northeastern China, researchers have taken two robotic dogs into lava caves by Jingbo Lake, where dim corridors and sudden drop-offs hint at lunar underground spaces. These robots are being trained not for Earth, but for what lies beneath the Moon’s surface.

The caves, formed by ancient lava flows, are striking in their resemblance to lunar lava tubes. In narrow passages too tight for humans, in chambers where light barely reaches, these robotic scouts move. They map, they avoid obstacles, they gather spatial data, and they build precise 3D models of environments hostile to the human body but open to machines. Peking University and the Beijing Academy of Artificial Intelligence are leading this work; Zhang Shanghang has helped design these machines.

One robot takes inspiration from an anteater, built with a flexible arm and sturdy base, suited to probing tight curves and surfaces. The other draws from the salamander, soft-wheeled and deformable, adept at crawling over irregular terrain and negotiating rugged slopes. Together they test “embodied intelligence” — a term that holds weight when mission success depends on a machine knowing how to perceive, decide, and act without human hands guiding every move.

These efforts form part of a broader vision: that lunar underground spaces, shielded from radiation, insulated from harsh temperature swings, could be the future sites of human bases. On the lunar surface, temperature can soar, then plummet; above, cosmic rays are relentless. Below ground, inside lava tubes, nature already provides many protections. To build safely, scientists need to know what lies under, what terrain shapes wait in shadow, how robots will behave when communication weakens and every misstep might trap them.

Walking through the cave, the robotic dogs encounter narrow squeezes where humans cannot pass. They chart the geometry of chambers, test their own sensors, try to anticipate unstable ground. It is a rehearsal in silence, a choreography of material and motion. Data collected now will guide design choices later — for motors, for joints, for sensor range, for durability.

The simulated moon underground research doesn’t end in the cave. Peking University has established a teaching and practice base at the site. Students, engineers, and scientists collaborate. They lay out seismic sensors, practice operations, test agility, compare how different robot designs perform under stress, under darkness, under constraint. Everything here is practice toward possible missions to the Moon or Mars.

This is not science fiction dressed in tomorrow’s gear. It is incremental: one robot sidesteps a rock, another navigates a tight turn; one sensor fails under dust, another holds steady. Each outcome teaches, shapes what comes next.

In the quiet tunnels of Earth, echoes of the Moon are heard — not in sound, but in form, in challenge, in ambition. China is testing two robotic dogs in lava caves at Jingbo Lake in Heilongjiang province that resemble lunar lava tubes. These machines autonomously navigate, map, and model underground terrain too narrow or hazardous for humans. Researchers say this work advances technology for future lunar underground exploration and potential human bases under the Moon’s surface.

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## Sources

• South China Morning Post

• Anadolu Agency

• CCTV (China Central Television)

• Peking University / Beijing Academy of Artificial Intelligence

• Tech.yahoo