NASA has narrowed down the field in a crowdsourcing campaign to design wheels for its new lunar rover, as the agency readies plans to establish a permanent base on the moon.

"The Rock and Roll with NASA Challenge" was launched on September 25, 2025, with the agency inviting public innovators to design and build next-generation lunar wheels. After NASA received 128 submissions from 49 countries, five teams advanced to the final phase of the competition on July 31 at NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas, where submitting teams presented their prototypes to NASA engineers.

Read More: NASA Lays Out Roadmap for Permanent Moon Base

As part of the challenge, NASA called on designers to craft lightweight, durable wheels that can last longer on the lunar surface, while still being able to absorb impacts, maintain traction at high speeds, and withstand the harsh environment of the moon. Designs from finalists included a wheel that uses an internal system that can change its stiffness depending on vehicle needs, while another submission uses tensioned cables that allow the wheel to flex without traditional spokes.

“Every additional kilometer a rover can reliably travel will expand how far we can explore, what science we can achieve, and what infrastructure we can build,” Johnson Space Center engineer Ed Herrera explained. 

Herrera added that NASA hopes that crowdsourcing the design will spark ideas that go beyond traditional approaches, and provide the agency with more options to meet the unique challenges of different terrains and lunar missions. 

In the next phase of the competition, NASA will evaluate how the wheels respond to lunar-like dust, the vacuum of space, and extreme temperatures. Engineers will also look at how the designs withstand longer distances at different sizes and loads.