- By Sutik Biswas
- india correspondent
The sun remains just above or below the horizon, casting dark shadows on the towering mountains.
The deep crater is a haven of endless darkness. Some of these areas have been blocked from sunlight for billions of years. In these regions, the moon has no surface-warming atmosphere, so temperatures drop to an astonishingly low -414°F (-248°C). No human has set foot in this utterly unexplored world.
According to NASA, the lunar south pole is full of “mysteries, science and conspiracies.”
No wonder there is a so-called space race to reach the South Pole of the Moon, far away from the Apollo landing sites concentrated near the equator.
India plans to land its Chandrayaan-3 robotic probe near Antarctica this week. (On Sunday, Russia’s Luna 25, which was expected to be the first to do this, crashed into the moon.) India, too, has joint plans ahead. Lunar Polar Expedition (Lupex) is planning a mission with Japan to explore the shadow realm, or “the far side of the moon,” by 2026.
Why is Antarctica emerging as an attractive scientific destination? Scientists argue the main reason is water.
Data collected by lunar reconnaissance orbiterNASA’s rover, which has been orbiting the Moon for 14 years, suggests water ice is present in part of a large, permanently shadowed crater that could potentially sustain humans. doing. (Because of the vacuum on the Moon, water exists either as a solid or as a vapor. The Moon does not have enough gravity to hold its atmosphere.) found for the first time evidence of
“It has not yet been proven whether water ice is accessible or minable. In other words, are there economically extractable water reserves?” Clive, Professor of Planetary Geology, University of Notre Dame, USA Neil told me
Scientists say the prospect of finding water on the Moon is exciting in many ways.
Frozen water, uncontaminated by the sun’s radiation, may have accumulated over millions of years in the cold polar regions, causing ice to accumulate at or near the surface. It provides a unique sample for scientists to analyze and understand the history of water in our solar system.
“We can address questions like when and where water came from and what impact it has on the evolution of life on Earth,” said a planetary scientist at the Open University in the UK. Yes, says Simeon Barber, who also works for the European Space Agency. agency.
Barber says there are other “practical” reasons to access water on or beneath the moon’s surface.
Many countries are planning new manned missions to the moon, and astronauts will need water for drinking and sanitation.
To transport equipment from Earth to the Moon, it is necessary to overcome Earth’s gravity. The bigger the device, the more rockets and fuel it will take to successfully land on the moon. A new commercial space company charges about $1 million to bring a one-kilogram payload to the moon.
“That’s worth $1 million per liter of drinking water. Space entrepreneurs will no doubt see lunar ice as an opportunity to provide local water for astronauts,” Barber said. .
That’s not all. Water molecules can be broken down into hydrogen and oxygen atoms, both of which can be used as propellants to launch rockets. But first, scientists need to know how much ice there is on the Moon, in what form, and whether it can be efficiently extracted and refined into a safe drink.
Also, some Antarctic extremes are exposed to the sun for long periods of time, with constant illumination of up to 200 Earth days. “Solar power is another resource.” [to set up a lunar base and power equipment] The polar regions have potential,” said NASA project scientist Noah Petro.
The moon’s south pole is also on the rim of the solar system’s giant impact crater. With a diameter of 2,500 km (1,600 miles) and a depth of up to 8 km, this crater is one of the oldest features in the solar system. “By landing at the poles, we can start to understand what’s going on in this big crater,” Petro said.
Traveling to the lunar pole with probes, spacesuits and sampling tools in a light and thermal environment distinctly different from those near the equator so far explored also promises valuable insights.
But scientists are shy about calling it a race to the South Pole. “These missions have been planned for decades and have been postponed many times. Race is irrelevant to our understanding of the moon. When was the last time there was a real space race?” After three years, we lost interest in the moon, and after 50 years we were back on the surface,” says Vishnu Reddy, professor of planetary sciences at the University of Arizona.
The Indian and Russian missions also had some common goals, scientists say.
Both aimed to land similarly sized spacecraft in Antarctica, further south of the equator than previous lunar missions.
After a failed landing program in 2019, India is trying to prove its ability to land on the moon precisely near the poles. It also aims to study the lunar exosphere, an extremely tenuous atmosphere, and to analyze the polar regolith, an accumulation of free particles and dust accumulated over billions of years on top of bedrock.
Luna 25’s objectives included analysis of polar regolith composition and examination of plasma and dust elements in the lunar exosphere.
Indeed, the Indian circulator’s landing site is “some distance from the actual poles.” “But the data [it provides] It’s going to be interesting,” Professor Neil said.
Russia and China have plans to build lunar space stations to develop research facilities on the moon’s surface, in orbit, or both. Russia is planning more Luna missions. NASA is sending instruments on private landers to reach locations on the far side of the moon.Japan is preparing to dispatch smart lander (SLIM Mission) August 26 – A small mission to demonstrate precise lunar landing techniques with a small rover.
And, of course, NASA’s Artemis program aims to bring astronauts back to the moon’s surface in a series of space flights, more than half a century after the last Apollo program.
“The moon is like a giant puzzle. We have some pieces, quarters and edges, based on samples and meteorite data on the moon. I have a picture of what it is, but it’s incomplete,” said Petro.
“The moon still surprises us.”
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