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On October 22, 2008, the Indian Space Research Organization launched Chandrayaan-1, India's first planetary probe on the moon, ten years ago. In a few weeks, the successor to the mission – Chandrayaan-2 – should do the same after many unexpected delays in its launch date, a report in the time of India I said.
Chandrayaan-1 was India's first planetary mission on the moon and led various experiments, Indian and international, on lunar orbit. The probe collected many important data during its mission in orbit and studied the chemistry, geology and mineral composition of the Moon for nearly a year.
Conclusions of Chandrayaan-1
Among his many discoveries were direct evidence of water on the moon. Data from the Moon Mineralogy Mapper on Chandrayaan-1 were crucial in allowing the results to directly prove that the moon does have water on its surface. These deposits were found in the form of concentrated ice near the polar regions of the moon.
A second instrument on Chandrayaan-1, the synthetic mini-synthetic radar (Mini-SAR), has also detected ice-water deposits in craters located on the other side of the moon. This has been a blind spot for past lunar missions as well as for Earth observations because it is not well studied, but is also inaccessible to satellite signals for communication with mission controllers on Earth.
A third instrument, the Indian Moon Impact Impact (MIP) Chandrayaan-1, collected water signatures in the lunar exosphere.
Finally, the discovery that made headlines around the world was the first "direct evidence" of the presence of water in the lunar atmosphere just above the surface of the moon, collected by the planet. Altitudinal composition instrument of Chandra (CHACE) as the probe descended to the moon.
These discoveries were made largely because the probe instruments were designed to detect even traces of water – in the form of hydroxyl ions (OH), as opposed to the more well-known form of the water molecule (H2O). This indicated that solar radiation rapidly spilled water into hydrogen ions, which escaped from the atmosphere, and hydroxyl ions, which remained as traces of water. . .
Image of representation. Image Courtesy: ISRO
The scientific missions of Chandrayaan-2
The Chandrayaan-1 sequel is the 800 Rs crore "Chandrayaan-2"unmanned mission, scheduled for January 3, 2019.
This comes almost ten years after ISRO's first mission to the moon, but features a rover and a lander unlike Chandrayaan-1. The 3,890 kg Chandrayaan-2 spacecraft will be launched aboard the GSK Mk-3 Geosynchronous Satellite Launch Vehicle (GSLV). The Lander will land gently on the lunar surface and unload the Rover to study and take measurements on the Moon, with the orbiter continuing to surround it 100 km above the surface.
The lander and the Chandrayaan-2 rover will be 600 km from the South Lunar Pole. If successful, it would be the first time that a lunar mission would land as far away from the equator, a report in Science I said.
The mobile, weighing just 25 kilograms and about the size of a briefcase, will carry two instruments that will study the elemental composition of the lunar surface: a laser decomposition spectroscope (LIBS) and an alpha particle X-ray spectrometer (APXS).
The probe also has an instrument for measuring the moon's plasma – a layer of charged molecules above the moon's surface that could explain why the lunar regolith, the dusty material covering the moon's surface , floats above the surface for long periods. Chandrayaan-2 will also carry a seismometer to record the earthquakes on the moon, following the efforts of Apollo 11 to study the phenomenon.
The mission will also provide a map of the moon topology, which could add many new discoveries to the existing data due to its unique landing site choice.
The hopes and challenges of the mission
The launch of Chandrayaan-2 was initialed for the second half of 2018.
"Chandrayaan-2 is scheduled for a window we are targeting from January 3 to February 16, 2019. This may happen at any time during this window, but we are aiming for the beginning of the window on January 3," Sivan said. addressing the media, according to to various reports.
When ISRO was asked about the rocket certification agency that would be carrying Indian astronauts, Sivan said ISRO would be the certification agency.
"You can say it's Chandrayaan-3 because the project has been completely reconfigured," Sivan told YOU. "If we had chosen the previous configuration, it would have been a disaster, they had not thought of so many problems, these are being fixed."
Sivan added that certification standards will be established with the help of the Directorate General of Civil Aviation; and that ISRO would like to benefit from the expertise of other countries in this regard.
With all the plans inscribed in the scientific agenda of Chandrayaan-2, a successful landing near the South Pole would in itself be a remarkable feat for ISRO and for the world of space exploration.
"One of NASA's top priorities is to go [to the south pole] on a return-of-samples mission, "James Greenwood, cosmochemist at Wesleyan University in Middletown, Connecticut said Science.
"So, that could help us as well later, in that they give us more information about what's out there."
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