Moon Rock’s first samples were brought back to Earth within nearly 50 years, borrowing from China to Britain.

Now, tiny dust locks inside the safe of Milton Keynes’ high security facilities – we looked at it for the first time.

Professor Mahesh Anand, the only scientist in the UK to be loaned to such extremely rare materials, described it as "more precious than gold dust".

"No one in the world can use China's samples, so it's a huge honor and a huge privilege," he said.

After grinding and knocking out dust with lasers, Professor Anand's team hopes to answer fundamental questions about how the moon formed and the early days of the planet.

Inside the dusty grain, scientists' theory is that the moon is thrown away when Earth hits a planet the size of Mars 4.5 billion years ago.

China collected rocks during its Chang'E 5 space mission when landing in a volcanic region called MonsRümker in 2020.

A robot's arm drilled into the soil and collected 2kg of material, which was taken back to land in capsules in Inner Mongolia.

This was the first successful lunar sampling since the Soviet mission in 1976 and leaped China to lead the new space race.

Now, following a tradition of global cooperation among space scientists, China has approved for the first time seven samples of international researchers to make new discoveries.

At a charming ceremony in Beijing last week, the vial was handed over to Professor Anand, where he met colleagues from Russia, Japan, Pakistan and Europe.

"It's almost like a parallel universe - China is already ahead of us in terms of their investment in space programs," he said.

He returned to England with his precious cargo, in the safest place he could think of - his hand luggage.

In his lab at Milton Keynes Open University, we stepped on sticky mats, put on shoes, plastic gloves, gowns, hair nets and hoods.

The environment of this high safety room must be spotless to prevent pollution.

If the earthly materials are mixed with the specifications of these external things, it could permanently undermine the analysis of Professor Anand's team.

We crouched on the floor in front of a row of safes. Professor Anand unlocks one and then carefully pulls out a zipper bag with three containers that are the size of a necklace to retain.

Strongly tied in each vial with a dark grey bottom.

That is Moonlight Dust.

It looks incredible, but it's frustrating to think of its cosmic journey.

Professor Anand said they don't need the 60mg in total.

He added: "Here, small is powerful. Trust me, enough to keep us busy for the next few years because we specialize in micro work."

In a lab in the corridor, technician Knight Kai will be the first to actually work on the grain when the vial is opened.

She has been shearing and grinding rocks for 36 years, but this will be the first time she works directly from the moon's surface.

"I'm so excited," she said after showing us how she used a diamond blade to cut a meteorite.

She added: "But I'm nervous - there's not too many samples, they really can't go more easily. It's a high bet."

After she prepares the samples, they will enter two more laboratories.

In one we see a machine with a complex network of countless tubes, valves and wires.

Technician Sasha Verchovskyhas has been building it since the early 1990s. He showed us a small cylinder that heats the dust specs to 1400 degrees Celsius. This will help them extract carbon, nitrogen and Nobel gases.

This is completely unique and one of the reasons Professor Anand believes his lab was chosen to receive rare samples.

Research technician James Malley operates a machine that can figure out how much oxygen is contained in the dust specification.

He showed us the test of what he was going to do.

"I'm going to hit the grain on the tray with a laser," he said.

"It will start to shine and you will see it melt inward," he said.

The team had a year to complete their research. By the end, they search for answers may end up breaking the sample.

But China has gone further since the Chang'E 5 mission.

In 2024, its Chang'e 6 release brought back the first samples from the far end of the moon. This is a very mysterious place, with possible evidence of long-term Quiet volcanic lava flows.

Professor Anand said: "I really hope this is the beginning of a long-term cooperation between China and international scientists."

He added: "Many of us are working on the samples returned by the Apollo mission, which I think is a wonderful tradition. I hope other countries will follow suit."