The Chang'e 4 robotic lander touched down inside Von Kármán crater at 02:26 UTC on the 3rd of January 2019. This event marked the first time any spacecraft had ever landed on the far side of the Moon.
Engineers launched a relay satellite named Queqiao in May 2018 to orbit behind the Moon at the L2 point. This satellite acts as a bridge that receives X band signals from the lander and relays them back to Earth using S band frequencies.
A sealed biosphere cylinder contained cottonseed, potato, rapeseed, Arabidopsis thaliana, yeast, and fruit fly eggs to test life support systems. Reports confirmed that cottonseed, rapeseed, and potato seeds sprouted within hours after landing before the experiment ended on the 16th of January 2019.
The Yutu-2 rover broke the lunar longevity record previously held by Lunokhod 1 by the 21st of November 2019. The Soviet rover operated from the 17th of November 1970 to the 4th of October 1971 while Chang'e 4 continued functioning well beyond its nominal three-month operating time.
Engineers launched a relay satellite named Queqiao in May 2018 to orbit behind the Moon at the L2 point. Two smaller microsatellites named Longjiang-1 and Longjiang-2 traveled alongside it during launch with Longjiang-2 succeeding until it crashed into Van Gent crater on the 31st of July 2019.