Much of the technology common in daily life today originates from the drive to put a human being on the Moon. This effort reached its pinnacle when Neil Armstrong stepped off the Eagle landing module onto the lunar surface 50 years ago.

As a NASA airborne astronomy ambassador and director of the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee Manfred Olson Planetarium, I know that the technologies behind weather forecasting, GPS, and even smartphones can trace their origins to the race to the Moon.

1. Rockets

A Saturn V rocket carrying Apollo 11 and its crew toward the Moon lifts off on July 16, 1969.

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