Lunar Exploration:The Next Frontier

Lunar exploration timeline

1957 – 1976 AD

US & USSR Landings

Composition of lunar surface  

1600 AD

Telescopic observations;

Physicalcharacteristics

 

2007 AD

Multinational effort to

return to the moon  

500 BC

Naked eye observations; Size, Orbital

characteristics,Composition

1990-2006 AD 

Chemical composition,

Magneticcharacteristics,

Presence ofwater

1800 AD

Photographic maps;

Origin of craters & maria

Greeks

• Anaxagorus, c. 450 BC - Moon reflects Sun’s light

• Democritus, c. 400 BC - Markings were mountains

• Aristarchus and Hipparchus, c. 200 BC - Measurements for size and distance

Early Understanding

• Distance to Moon– Greeks: 375,000 – 460,000 km– Present: 384,400 km

• Circumference: – Greeks: 14,000 km– Present: 10,916 km

• Orbital Period: 27.3 days• Nature

– Stone sphere with an irregular surface

The 17th Century

• Galileo Galilei – Started telescopic observation of the sky in 1610

• Robert Hooke - Experimentally modeled lunar craters

• Cassini - Best map of moon at the time

Pre-Space Program

• Grove Karl Gilbert – In 1893 correctly stated origin of craters and nature of maria, later proved by Ralph Belknap Baldwin

• Better maps thanks to photographry, culminating in 1935, with Fred E Wright’s lunar globes

Telescopic Discoveries

• Lunar surface marked by craters and maria.• No water and no discernable atmosphere.• Impact origin of craters.• Basalt composition of maria.• Photographic plates increase accuracy of maps.

Space Age Begins

• Sputnik 1, launched October 4, 1957, was the first artificial satellite

• Yuri Alekseyevich Gagarin – On April 12, 1961

became the first man in space aboard the Vostok 1

– Spent 1 hour, 48 minutes in space

America’s First Steps• Project Mercury

– Ran from 1959 to 1963– On May 5, 1961, put Alan

Shepard into space for 15 minutes and 28 seconds, the first American in space

– Later John Glenn became the first American to orbit Earth

• On Sept 12, 1962, President Kennedy rallied the American public behind the “space race”

Soviet Lunar Contact

• January of 1959, the Soviet Union sent their first mission to the moon - Luna 1 did not impact as intended, and was instead the first lunar flyby

• Luna 2 crashed as planned near Archimedes in Sept.

• Luna 3 returned the first photos (very poor) of the far side in October.

American Lunar Contact

• Ranger 4, launched in April,1962, is the first and still only contact with far side (intended to hit nearside!)

• Ranger 7 successfully crash landed in July, 1964; sent real-time high resolution photos of Mare Cognitum

Soft Contacts

• Luna 9 – Feb, 1966– First soft landing

• Surveyor I – June, 1966– First study of lunar rocks

and soils from a US soft lander.

New Perspectives

• Lunar Orbiter 4 – May, 1967– Most widely used lunar

images ever obtained

• Surveyor 6 – Nov, 1967– First spacecraft to take off

from Moon (hopped 8 ft for stereo views)

The Apollo Program• Apollo 1

– Jan 27, 1967– Fire kills three astronauts

Program continues cautiously, using first unmanned and later manned missions from 1967-69 to test all the moon landing technology.

Apollo 11

• Apollo 11– July 20, 1969– Neil Armstong, Buzz Aldrin,

and Michael Collins– "One small step for (a) man,

one giant leap for mankind."

The End of an Era

• Apollo missions continued landing men on the moon, closing with Apollo 17 in 1972. The Soviets never sent a manned mission to the moon.

• Luna 24 – USSR– 1976– last lunar probe for

25 years. Brought back samples of lunar soil.

New Insights

• Astronauts experienced no atmosphere and low gravity

• Seismic stations installed – crust about 10% volume

• 382 kg of rock and soil from Apollo and Luna missions

• Regolith consists of mineral dust and rock fragments; the marias are basalt

• Old rocks allow study of Solar System history

Current Programs

• Hiten – Jan, 1990– Japanese Lunar Orbiter– Failed to send back data.

• Clementine – US Lunar Orbiter– 1994– Multi-spectral imaging of

the entire lunar surface.

Current Programs

• Lunar Prospector – US, 1998– Global mapping of

radioactivity and elemental composition

– Discovered polar water ice

• Smart 1 – Europe, 2003– Tested the solar-powered ion

thruster

Future: 2007 and beyond

• Chang‘e 1 - Chinese lunar orbiter

• Chandrayaan 1 - Indian lunar orbiter and impactor

• SELENE, LUNAR-A – Japanese projects to study the Moon’s origin, evolution and tectonics.

The Vision for Space Exploration

• The US plans to return to the moon.

• The Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter, developed at Goddard Space Flight Center, is to be launched in 2008.

• A new Crew Exploration Vehicle is being designed, with new boosters to get it and additional payloads to the moon.

Future for the US

• In the next year:– Orbital research using Lunar Reconnaissance

Orbiter satellite– Develop Crew Exploration Vehicle (CEV)– Carry out robotic exploration of lunar surface

• Complete ISS by 2010• First crewed flights by 2014• Extended human missions as early as

2015• Human exploration no later than 2020