The Importance of Being Earnest-When You Crave China’s Lunar Samples

Last week, Brown University and Stony Brook University finally cast off the cross of the Wolf Amendment and secured the opportunity to study China’s lunar samples brought back by the Chang’e-5 mission. If all goes smoothly, the only remaining hurdle for these two American universities will be the FBI.

April 29, 2025

The China Academy

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While the end of the tariff war remains distant, another long-standing area of competition between China and the U.S. has seen a positive development — assuming the U.S. Congress has the foresight to seize it.

On April 24, 2025, China’s National Space Administration (CNSA) announced that among all applicants, seven institutions across six countries would be granted loans of China’s lunar samples— including two U.S. universities: Brown University and Stony Brook University.

a circular metal container with a clear glass center, through which grey dirt can be seen Lunar soil retrieved by China’s Chang’e 5 mission. (Image credit: Yang Bo/China News Service via Getty Images)

Just over a year ago, whether China should even offer lunar samples to the U.S. was at the center of intense debates across Chinese internet. When NASA spokesperson Faith McKie complained that NASA hadn’t got “any direct invitation” to study China’s moon rocks, he was kindly reminded by the spokesperson of the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the “Wolf Amendment” passed by US Congress in 2011. The piece of legislation prohibits NASA from bilateral cooperation with the Chinese government and China-affiliated organizations, and hence renders China’ s invitation to global scientists to study China’s lunar samples inapplicable to NASA.

Given that the U.S. had even excluded China from participating in the International Space Station project, Chinese netizens were in no mood of a cooperation when an internal email of NASA surfaced, showing how NASA was nudging the Congress for a permission to bypass “Wolf Amendment” on China’s lunar sample.

Now that the Chinese scientific community has decided to take the high road, it remains to be seen whether FBI also has the future of humanity in mind-the two American universities will still need to secure special congressional approval and cooperate with the FBI to obtain a so-called national security certification before they can start celebrating for receiving the samples.

A sample of lunar soil brought by China’s Chang’e-5 spacecraft on display at the National Museum in Beijing, China, March 28, 2021.