Dust can be a nuisance on Earth, but beyond the Earth’s atmosphere, it becomes a real nightmare.

As the world was eagerly awaiting the first landing by humans on the Moon, nobody could predict what those first astronauts would encounter. It turned out that one of their biggest challenges would come in the form of the fine grey dust coating the lunar surface.

Extremely fine and razor sharp like glass, lunar dust clings to everything it touches and is now known to clog mechanisms, interfere with instruments, cause radiators to overheat and even tear up spacesuits.

It was an astronomical challenge that Australian physicist Dr Brian O’Brien became privy to almost by accident during a meeting with NASA officials in 1965, but his revolutionary invention was anything but a fluke, and one that would later top his already stellar CV.

O’Brien had studied auroras in Antarctica and launched early satellites into space before becoming involved with NASA when one of his experiments, the Charged Particle Lunar Environment Experiment (or CPLEE), was chosen as one of the first experiments to go to the Moon with the Apollo astronauts.

Soon after he learned from NASA officials that lunar dust posed a potential hazard for Moon missions when he was told that his CPLEE needed to include a dust cover to avoid damage from the hazardous substance.

NASA had ruled out any plans to measure lunar dust at this stage because it was believed an extra experiment would add too much weight to the payload, and too much extra time for the astronauts to deploy.

But O’Brien saw an answer, and on the flight back home, he sketched out on the back of a coaster the design for a dust detector which would meet NASA’s concerns, later refining it on an airplane napkin.

What he drew up turned out to be a Dust Detector Experiment (DDE) – a matchbox-sized invention weighing just 270 grams.

The box featured three solar cells which generate a voltage, and when dust settled on the cells, the voltage would drop. By tracking these changes, the DDE could study how lunar dust moved and behaved.

It was ingeniously simple – light enough not to add significant weight to the payload, and small enough to be attached to another experiment or the central station of the experiment package, requiring no extra time for the astronauts to deploy.

O’Brien’s invention ultimately won out, and his DDEs blasted off to the Moon with Apollo missions 11, 12, 14 and 15. One small invention, one giant leap for space missions!