As a huge football fan with a love for physics and all things space, when the IET asked if I wanted to be part of this year’s Moon United campaign, I couldn’t say no! This had my name written all over it.

I wanted to be an astronaut when I was little, and I’ve always loved the idea of potentially living on other planets in the future. And with the 2025 Lunar mission fast approaching, we could be inhabiting the Moon sooner than we think!

My view is that there will be three main aspects to our future in space…as you can tell, I’ve given this some thought! The first will be the rise of space tourism, where people can pay to visit space for a few hours or maybe stay in space hotels for a few days on holiday. The second is exploration. I think we will likely colonise Mars at some point in the relatively near future. We will also return to the Moon and likely establish a Moon Base and create the Lunar Gateway, enabling exploration of the rest of the solar system. Finally, we will focus on defence of humanity. Space is dangerous and there are lots of threats to humanity's future. I imagine we will be deploying more craft to help destroy or deflect asteroids that could collide with Earth, and attempting to learn more about solar flares which can damage communications systems, electronics, and satellites.

However, I hadn’t considered playing football on the Moon – until now…

I got the chance to work alongside the incredible minds of Sophie Harker, Eneni Bambara-Abban, Brian David Johnson, Ama Frimpong and Abbie Hutty, getting down into the real science and engineering that would be needed to achieve a game of lunar football.

As a Software Engineer who specialises in ensuring software quality, my work involves ensuring our software complies with various international safety standards and regulations. I look at not just our code, but also our processes, culture and team to see where quality can be improved to ensure we deliver reliable products. Essentially this means I'm good at looking at the rules and seeing how well we abide by them. This was great when trying to come up with the rules for lunar football and seeing how the Earth rules need to be amended to suit the ecosystem of the Moon.

Given the Moon has one-sixth of the Earth’s gravity, a surface of dusty soil and no breathable atmosphere, the game will look very different - a non-contact sport, with no out-of-bounds play and flexible suits with AR helmets to deal with the harsh conditions of space. But it will still be an exciting game of skill, passion and creativity!

We’ve determined how a game of football will need to be adapted and the technological advances we’ll need to be able to do so. The core principles of the sport remain unchanged but the way in which a match is played has been fundamentally overhauled to bring football to the Moon.

We’ve thought of everything from how solar flares could impact the communication during the game, to the material composition of the football, and of course, the impact of reduced gravity on the lunar surface.

All of this got me thinking about software and how it’s going to play a key role in the future of space exploration. We will need programmes to help regulate oxygen levels, send communications back to Earth, determine launch trajectories for space craft - and that's just the tip of the iceberg. Space is also potentially the harshest of all known environments, so we will need to build software that astronauts can trust to keep them safe, which is where the world of safety critical software comes into its own.

And to get the next generation thinking about what we’d need to exist on the Moon and the incredible world of STEM, the IET has launched a competition for children aged 4-13. We’re calling all football fans and players, sports enthusiasts, space explorers, designers and innovators to help get our Moon United footballers of the future Moon-fit, suited and booted and ready to play! We want young people to design the very first Moon United football kit – specially designed and adapted for space.

The competition is part of the IET’s Engineer a Better World campaign which is all about inspiring the engineers of tomorrow through the world of STEM.

With a nationwide shortage of engineers, there’s never been a more important time to encourage young people to feel excited about STEM and nurture their natural curiosity about how the world works and why.

We need to work hard to inspire the next generation – and it’s critical we do this from a young age. Giving them an insight into engineering and technology in action will help provide them with more opportunities to realise their passions and give them access to a greater pool of career choices.

I was excited about our future in space before, but after working on this campaign with the IET, it’s taken my excitement to a whole other level! I absolutely loved working on Moon United and as we continue to push boundaries and explore further horizons, it’s clear that engineers will help us bring the very best of what Earth has to offer along with us and I can’t wait!

Head to the IET’s Engineer a Better World website to find out more.