Other 2008 Events - India

On October 22nd of this year the Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO) launched its first probe to our Moon - the Chandrayaan-1. This 2,875-pound spacecraft is scheduled to spend up to two years mapping lunar terrain and studying the satellite's minerals from an orbit about 62 miles high. The probe carries 5 scientific payloads from Indian institutions and another 6 from other countries, including the United States.

This artist's concept shows the Indian lunar mission Chandrayaan 1. Credit: ISRO

NASA's Moon Mineralogy Mapper is aboard the Chandrayaan-1. This device, called the M3, is a 15-pound imaging spectrometer from the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif. The M3 will map the moon's mineral resources (including water at the poles) through high resolution visible and near-infrared wavelengths. NASA officials will then use these maps to plan future Moon mission landing sites.

Other instruments include:

• C1XS - an Europen Space Agency (ESA)-funded payload jointly developed by the U.K. lab, the University of Helsinki and ISRO. C1XS will survey the chemical compounds on the moon by detecting the X-ray signature of surface elements.
• RADOM - a Bulgarian radiation detector.
• SIR 2 - a German near-infrared spectrometer. Financed by ESA, this device will provide information similar to the M3 but on a much narrower spectral band.
• MiniSAR - a U.S. payload from the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory, specifically planned to accompany M3 to look for signs of water ice near the Moon's poles.
• SARA - an ESA-funded probe, which includes component parts from Sweden, Switzerland, Japan and India. The probe will monitor solar wind particles impacting the lunar surface.

One of India's own devices is a 64-pound impactor to be dropped from the orbiting spacecraft for a nosedive into the moon. Hopefully, this crash landing will also provide valuable data on the Moon's composition.

So, the race is on and luckily the United States is part of this Indian mission so it can plan for it own return to the Moon. And India joins a small club of countries that have been to the Moon - the U.S., Russia, ESA, Japan and China. Rumors are that India plans to put a rover on the moon in 2011 and possibly follow this with a manned mission.

Time to Take a Look Again...

Okay, I have been gone for awhile, so now that I am back and we have a new President, we must be back on track for Mars, right? Let's take a look. How many times is Mars mentioned in President-Elect Obama's Plan for America? I went to his Change.gov and visited the "Technology" section but could not find a single sentence on the Moon or Mars. In fact, I searched the entire site and could not find anything on Mars. Does this mean we are Earth-bound for another generation? This is not clear, but it appears stem cells and patent protection will be more important in the near future than exploring the great unknown. Fortunately, the plan has one section called Invest in the Sciences stating his Plan would "Double federal funding for basic research over ten years, changing the posture of our federal government to one that embraces science and technology." I guess we can fit the space program in there somewhere. I am not sure how that will do against other topics such as addressing the dropout crisis and diverse media ownership, but we shall see.

Note: To be fair, in his December 20, 2008 YouTube address, he did use the word "Moon" once, as shown below: 

Right now, in labs, classrooms and companies across America, our leading minds are hard at work chasing the next big idea, on the cusp of breakthroughs that could revolutionize our lives. But history tells us that they cannot do it alone. From landing on the moon, to sequencing the human genome, to inventing the Internet, America has been the first to cross that new frontier because we had leaders who paved the way: leaders like President Kennedy, who inspired us to push the boundaries of the known world and achieve the impossible; leaders who not only invested in our scientists, but who respected the integrity of the scientific process.

Let the Space Race Continue!

Once again we are looking to private initiative to find a new way into space, and $30 million is a nice incentive. Launched in September 2007, the Google Lunar X PRIZE is an international competition to safely land a robot on the surface of the Moon, travel 500 meters over the lunar surface, and send images and data back to the Earth. Teams must be at least 90% privately funded and must be registered to compete by December 31, 2010. The first team to land on the Moon and complete the mission objectives will be awarded $20 million; the full first prize is available until December 31, 2012. After that date, the first prize will drop to $15 million. The second team to do so will be awarded $5 million. Another $5 million will awarded in bonus prizes. The final deadline for winning the prize is December 31, 2014.

And the interest is impressive. Dr. Peter H. Diamandis, Chairman and CEO of the X PRIZE Foundation, announced the teams at Google Headquarters in Mountain View, California. “I’m very pleased to welcome our first 10 fully registered teams to the Google Lunar X PRIZE. Only 6 months after the announcement of this competition, the response has been incredible – we’ve received over 560 expressions of interest from more than 53 nations."

With the U.S. government, China, Japan and others pushing for the moon as well, it is a positive sign to see a truly open international competition to open up the moon. Just as we had our period of settling the western spaces in America, it seems the new slogan could be "Go up, young man".

Why the Moon?

If you have asked yourself that question, then you are the prime audience for NASA's poster "Why the Moon?" You can get a copy here.

News on Mercury!

On January 14, the MESSENGER spacecraft (MErcury Surface, Space ENvironment, Geochemistry, and Ranging) flew by Mercury and took a unique picture showing a side of the planet we have never seen. The image shown was taken 18 minutes after close approach, when MESSENGER was about 3,000 miles away from the planet. The image is about 125 miles across.

Launched in the summer of 2004, the MESSENGER spacecraft is expected to go into orbit around Mercury in 2011 after a 4.9-billion mile journey that includes 15 trips around the sun. MESSENGER is only the second spacecraft sent to Mercury - Mariner 10 flew past it three times in 1974-75.