Interesting concept. I don't know if "spikes" are best suited for the moon, something with a larger footprint might be more suited to the dust - keeping this out of the telescopic components might prove to be an issue long term. The propulsion method generally seems viable - that's a lot of actuators to move all the spikes tho... to think of a 1meter ball, and spikes, I'm thinking 30-50 spikes to get good movement in any given direction. Unless you have some cunning method to push them out from the inside by a gyroscoped mechanism. That could take a lot less actuators. To assume there's some vague intent to have these mass deployed for surface(and by topic of your post, assumed subsurface) exploration then to relay telemetrics from every unit would rapidly consume massive amounts of bandwidth. Instead, log and recycle the logs and have provision to obtain on demand. Unless you don't expect it to come back. Thusly operators or other spike sphere can use some sort of API to request the specific data they require, when they require it, from where they require it. Less total transmissions. What powers the power sphere? IR reflection might be good as a distance sensor, in the tips of spikes, but unless this sphere is clear I don't see many ways to get that reflection into a CMOS - a camera at the tip of spikes will give multiple redundant copies, but massively increase cost and weight over having a single sensor, or small cluster. It'd also place them in the most likely (IMHO) place to get damaged. The other method that sprang to mind would be multiple camera on the outside of the sphere - and hope they don't pack up with moon dust. This would also give mulitple redundant copies, and if you got the sphere rolling fast enough, and switched camera feed fast enough, you might be able to get a constant "straight ahead" (or any other angle) veiw. With some cunning software you could compile footage that operators could watch without strain or discomfort. I assume these things would be behaving somewhat like worker ants, plotting up a nest site?