Editing Apollo program (section)

==Legacy==
===Science and engineering===
{{further|NASA spin-off technologies}}
[[File:Margaret Hamilton.gif|thumb|[[Margaret Hamilton (scientist)|Margaret Hamilton]] standing next to the navigation software that she and her MIT team produced for the Apollo project]]
The Apollo program has been described as the greatest technological achievement in human history.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Apollo 11 30th Anniversary: Introduction |publisher=NASA History Office |date=1999 |url=https://history.nasa.gov/ap11ann/introduction.htm |access-date=April 26, 2013}}</ref> Apollo stimulated many areas of technology, leading to over 1,800 spinoff products as of 2015, including advances in the development of [[cordless]] power tools, [[Fireproofing|fireproof materials]], [[heart monitors]], [[solar panel]]s, [[digital imaging]], and the use of [[liquid methane]] as fuel.<ref name="January 2005">{{cite web |last=O'Rangers |first=Eleanor A. |date=January 26, 2005 |title=NASA Spin-offs: Bringing Space Down to Earth |url=https://www.space.com/731-nasa-spin-offs-bringing-space-earth.html |access-date=2024-04-23 |website=Space.com}}</ref><ref name=":0">{{Cite web |title=Benefits from Apollo: Giant Leaps in Technology |url=https://www.nasa.gov/sites/default/files/80660main_ApolloFS.pdf |archive-url=https://ghostarchive.org/archive/20221009/https://www.nasa.gov/sites/default/files/80660main_ApolloFS.pdf |archive-date=2022-10-09 |url-status=live |website=NASA}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=https://spinoff.nasa.gov/search/node |website=NASA Spinoff |publisher=National Aeronautics and Space Administration |title=Search |access-date=April 24, 2024}}</ref> The [[Apollo Guidance Computer|flight computer]] design used in both the lunar and command modules was, along with the [[UGM-27 Polaris|Polaris]] and [[LGM-30 Minuteman|Minuteman]] missile systems, the driving force behind early research into [[integrated circuit]]s (ICs). By 1963, Apollo was using 60 percent of the United States' production of ICs. The crucial difference between the requirements of Apollo and the missile programs was Apollo's much greater need for reliability. While the Navy and Air Force could work around reliability problems by deploying more missiles, the political and financial cost of failure of an Apollo mission was unacceptably high.{{sfn|Mindell|2008|pp=125–131}}

Technologies and techniques required for Apollo were developed by Project Gemini.{{sfn|Brooks|Grimwood|Swenson|1979|pp=181–182, 205–208}} The Apollo project was enabled by NASA's adoption of new advances in [[semiconductor]] [[electronic technology]], including [[metal–oxide–semiconductor field-effect transistor]]s (MOSFETs) in the [[Interplanetary Monitoring Platform]] (IMP)<ref>{{cite book |title=Interplanetary Monitoring Platform |date=29 August 1989 |publisher=[[NASA]] |pages=1, 11, 134 |url=https://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/19800012928.pdf |archive-url=https://ghostarchive.org/archive/20221009/https://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/19800012928.pdf |archive-date=2022-10-09 |url-status=live |access-date=12 August 2019|last1=Butler |first1=P. M. }}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |last1=White |first1=H. D. |last2=Lokerson |first2=D. C. |title=The Evolution of IMP Spacecraft Mosfet Data Systems |journal=[[IEEE Transactions on Nuclear Science]] |date=1971 |volume=18 |issue=1 |pages=233–236 |doi=10.1109/TNS.1971.4325871 |bibcode=1971ITNS...18..233W |issn=0018-9499}}</ref> and [[silicon]] [[integrated circuit]] chips in the [[Apollo Guidance Computer]] (AGC).<ref>{{cite web |title=Apollo Guidance Computer and the First Silicon Chips |url=https://airandspace.si.edu/stories/editorial/apollo-guidance-computer-and-first-silicon-chips |website=[[National Air and Space Museum]] |publisher=[[Smithsonian Institution]] |access-date=1 September 2019 |date=14 October 2015}}</ref>

===Cultural impact===
[[File:The Earth seen from Apollo 17.jpg|thumb|right|''[[The Blue Marble]]'' photograph taken on December{{nbsp}}7, 1972, during Apollo 17. "We went to explore the Moon, and in fact discovered the Earth." —[[Eugene Cernan]]]]

The crew of Apollo 8 sent the first live televised pictures of the Earth and the Moon back to Earth, and read from the creation story in the [[Book of Genesis]], on Christmas Eve 1968.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.nasa.gov/topics/history/features/apollo_8.html|website=NASA|access-date=July 20, 2016|title=Apollo 8: Christmas at the Moon|date=February 19, 2015}}</ref> An estimated one-quarter of the population of the world saw—either live or delayed—the Christmas Eve transmission during the ninth orbit of the Moon,<ref>[[#Chaikin|Chaikin 1994]], p. 120</ref> and an estimated one-fifth of the population of the world watched the live transmission of the Apollo 11 moonwalk.<ref>[[#Burrows|Burrows 1999]], p. 429</ref>

The Apollo program also affected [[environmental activism]] in the 1970s due to photos taken by the astronauts. The most well known include ''[[Earthrise]]'', taken by [[William Anders]] on Apollo 8, and ''[[The Blue Marble]]'', taken by the Apollo 17 astronauts. ''The Blue Marble'' was released during a surge in environmentalism, and became a symbol of the environmental movement as a depiction of Earth's frailty, vulnerability, and isolation amid the vast expanse of space.<ref name=Petsko>{{cite journal |last=Petsko |first=Gregory A|title=The blue marble |journal=[[Genome Biology]] |volume=12 |issue=4 |page=112 |doi=10.1186/gb-2011-12-4-112 |date=2011|pmc=3218853 |pmid=21554751 |doi-access=free }}</ref>

According to ''[[The Economist]]'', Apollo succeeded in accomplishing President Kennedy's goal of taking on the Soviet Union in the [[Space Race]] by accomplishing a singular and significant achievement, to demonstrate the superiority of the [[capitalism|free-market system]]. The publication noted the irony that in order to achieve the goal, the program required the organization of tremendous public resources within a vast, centralized government bureaucracy.<ref>{{cite news |title=Apollo plus 50 |editor-last=Lexington |url=http://www.economist.com/node/18712369 |newspaper=[[The Economist]] |publisher=[[Economist Group|The Economist Newspaper Limited]] |location=London |date=May 21, 2011 |page=36 |access-date=August 1, 2013}}</ref>

===Apollo 11 broadcast data restoration project===
{{main|Apollo 11 missing tapes}}

Prior to Apollo 11's 40th anniversary in 2009, NASA searched for the original videotapes of the mission's live televised moonwalk. After an exhaustive three-year search, it was concluded that the tapes had probably been erased and reused. A new digitally remastered version of the best available broadcast television footage was released instead.<ref name=NPR_tapes>{{cite web |url=https://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=106637066 |title=Houston, We Erased The Apollo 11 Tapes |last=Greenfieldboyce |first=Nell |author-link=Nell Greenfieldboyce |date=July 16, 2009 |work=[[NPR]] |publisher=National Public Radio, Inc. |location=Washington, D.C. |access-date=August 1, 2013}}</ref>