Although NASA’s chief scientist expressed hope for future exchange of Apollo-era lunar specimens with those retrieved by China’s Chang’e-5 mission, the agency presently has no intentions to do so. At the Lunar Exploration Analysis Group’s annual conference on August 31, Jim Green noted that limits in US legislation on bilateral collaboration between NASA and Chinese companies had ruled out any exchange of lunar samples for the time being.
“At this time, there are no intentions to form a bilateral agreement with China on sample exchange,” he added, referencing the Wolf Amendment, a decade-old clause in annual spending bills that prohibits such collaboration.