What are lunar volatiles?

Think of lunar volatiles as the Moon’s hidden stash of ice and gas that wants to escape into space.

Imagine a soda bottle. When you shake it, the fizz tries to burst out. On the Moon, volatiles are substances like water, oxygen, and carbon dioxide that act like that fizz. They are "flighty", they easily turn from solid or liquid into gas. Because the Moon has very weak gravity and almost no air, these gases usually float away into space.

Most of these precious materials live in the Moon’s dark, frozen craters near the poles. It is like putting a popsicle in a freezer that never turns off. The cold traps keep the ice from turning into gas and flying off. Scientists want to find this ice because it can become drinking water, rocket fuel, or even air for future space explorers. It is not magic; it is just stuff that likes to fly away, but gets caught in the Moon’s icy pockets.