“FLOAT robots have no moving parts and levitate over the track to minimize lunar dust abrasion / wear, unlike lunar robots with wheels, legs, or tracks,” FLOAT’s project description explains, adding that the tracks will ideally also “unroll directly onto the lunar regolith to avoid major on-site construction.”

NASA is exploring the idea of building a railway on the lunar surface that uses levitating robots to provide “reliable, autonomous, and efficient payload transport on the moon.” The space agency said the Flexible Levitation on a Track (FLOAT) system would play a key role in the daily operations of an astronaut-inhabited lunar base,

NASA's plan to build a train track on the moon is part of the agency's Innovative Advanced Concepts program, which aims to develop "science fiction-like" projects for future space exploration.