International Lunar Observatory

Last updated
International Lunar Observatory (ILO)
NamesILO-1 (Flagship Mission to Lunar South Pole, launching 2025-26 TBD) ILO-2 (Backup Mission, TBD)
Mission typeTechnology, Astronomy
OperatorInternational Lunar Observatory Association (ILOA Hawai'i)
Website https://iloa.org/the-ilo-mission/
Spacecraft properties
Spacecraft typeTBD
ManufacturerLander: TBD
Telescope: Canadensys Aerospace
Start of mission
Launch date2025-26 (planned) [1]
RocketTBD
Launch siteTBD
ContractorTBD
Moon lander
Main telescope
NameILO-1
Type TBD

The International Lunar Observatory (ILO) is a private scientific and commercial lunar mission by the International Lunar Observatory Association (ILOA Hawai'i) [2] of Kamuela, Hawaii to place a permanent observatory near the South Pole of the Moon to conduct astrophysical studies using an optical telescope and possibly an antenna dish. [3] The mission aims to prove a conceptual design for a lunar observatory that would be reliable, low cost, and fast to implement. A precursor mission, ILO-X [4] consisting of two small imagers (totaling less than 0.6 kg), launched on 15 February 2024 aboard the Intuitive Machines IM-1 mission to the Moon south pole region. [1] It is hoped to be a technology precursor to a future observatories on the Moon, and other commercial initiatives. [5] [6] [7]

Contents

The ILO-1 mission is being organized by the International Lunar Observatory Association [8] and the Space Age Publishing Company. [9] It was planned to be launched in 2008 with development by SpaceDev, [10] and was first delayed to 2013. [11] The prime contractors originally were Moon Express, providing the MX-1E lander, [12] and Canadensys Aerospace, providing the optical telescope system. [13] [14] The estimated cost in 2004 was of US$50 million. [15]

Overview

The ILO-1 mission, was later scheduled to be launched in July 2020 with an Electron rocket from New Zealand. [16] The mission was called Moon Express Lunar Scout, and it would have used the MX-1E lander to deliver the observatory on top of the Malapert Mountain, a 5 km tall peak in the Aitken Basin region that has an uninterrupted direct line of sight to Earth, which facilitates communications any time. [12] [17] The original launch of the MX-1E lander with an Electron rocket was cancelled sometime before February 2020; no launch date or launch rocket for the MX-1E has been since announced, leaving the status of it unknown. [18] The ILO-1 flagship payload, and its back up ILO-2, is still being advanced through work by Canadensys Aerospace Corporation (March 2024) [19] while ILOA seeks a different landing provider and partner to land on Malapert Mountain. ILO-1 or ILO-2 may fly with Intuitive Machines to the Moon South Pole region in late 2024 aboard IM-2, or fly with other international or national lunar missions currently under development. [20]

The small robotic ILO-1 observatory is designed to withstand the long lunar nights so it is expected to operate for a few years. [17] Moon Express would have also utilized the mission to explore the Moon's South Pole for mineral resources including water ice. [12] [6] The original plan for the ILO-1 included an optical portion of the system is a Schmidt–Cassegrain telescope. [21] That optical system uses a 7 cm diameter lens, with an 18 cm focal plane, a 13 cm f/5.6 aperture, [6] [22] and 6.4-megapixel resolution. [5] The telescope system would have been "about the size of a shoe-box" with a mass of approximately 2 kg. [5] [6] As of 2024, the instruments for ILO-1 and ILO-2 are under consideration which main goals being astronomy from the Moon and imaging the Milky Way Galaxy Center. [23]

Some collaborators include the National Astronomical Observatory of China (NAOC), Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO), the newly formed Southeast Asia Principal Operating Partnership, and others. [24] [25]

ILO-X precursor

An ILO-X Precursor instruments were launched on the Intuitive Machines Nova-C IM-1 mission on 15 February 2024. [26] IM-1 landed on the Moon on 22 February, about halfway through the lunar day. Since the lander is unprotected from the cold lunar night, it was only expected to operate until sunset, about seven earth days. ILO-X includes both wide-field and narrow-field imaging systems. [27] The narrow field-of-view imager was named "Ka 'Imi" (To Search) after a student won the Moon Camera Naming Contest held statewide in Hawai'i from March-May 2022. [28] There was an auction [29] to name the wide field-of-view instrument which closed 22 March 2024 and resulted in the winning name Lunar Codex being proposed and accepted. [30] ILOA released its first images from the ILO-X wide field-of-view imager to the public on 29 February 2024 which included one image taken during Deorbit, Descent and Landing (DDL) on 22 February 2024 about 4.2 minutes prior to touchdown which occurred 23:24 UTC, and another image post-landing taken at about 00:30 UTC on 25 February 2024 which shows portions of the lunar landscape, regolith / dust, the Sun, and the IM-1 Odysseus lunar lander. [31] The company received a total of 9 high-resolution and 105 thumbnail images from the ILO-X imagers, [32] but the mission did not fulfill its main astronomy mission goals to capture images of the Milky Way Galaxy or stars in the celestial sky due to off-nominal pointing of the lander. [33]

Objective

The mission's objective is to conduct astrophysical observations from the surface of the Moon, whose lack of atmosphere eliminates much of the need for costly adaptive optics technology. [34] Also, since the Moon's days (about fourteen Earth days) have a dark sky, it allows for nonstop astronomical observations. [34] Disadvantages include micrometeorite impacts, cosmic and solar radiation, lunar dust, and temperature shifts as large as 350 °C. [34] The mission aims to acquire images of galaxies, stars, planets, the Moon and Earth. The project will promote commercial access to the telescope use to schools, scientists and the public at large through the Internet. [5]

See also

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ultraviolet astronomy</span> Observation of electromagnetic radiation at ultraviolet wavelengths

Ultraviolet astronomy is the observation of electromagnetic radiation at ultraviolet wavelengths between approximately 10 and 320 nanometres; shorter wavelengths—higher energy photons—are studied by X-ray astronomy and gamma-ray astronomy. Ultraviolet light is not visible to the human eye. Most of the light at these wavelengths is absorbed by the Earth's atmosphere, so observations at these wavelengths must be performed from the upper atmosphere or from space.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Chandra X-ray Observatory</span> NASA space telescope launched in 1999

The Chandra X-ray Observatory (CXO), previously known as the Advanced X-ray Astrophysics Facility (AXAF), is a Flagship-class space telescope launched aboard the Space ShuttleColumbia during STS-93 by NASA on July 23, 1999. Chandra was sensitive to X-ray sources 100 times fainter than any previous X-ray telescope, enabled by the high angular resolution of its mirrors. Since the Earth's atmosphere absorbs the vast majority of X-rays, they are not detectable from Earth-based telescopes; therefore space-based telescopes are required to make these observations. Chandra is an Earth satellite in a 64-hour orbit, and its mission is ongoing as of 2024.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Great Observatories program</span> Series of NASA satellites

NASA's series of Great Observatories satellites are four large, powerful space-based astronomical telescopes launched between 1990 and 2003. They were built with different technology to examine specific wavelength/energy regions of the electromagnetic spectrum: gamma rays, X-rays, visible and ultraviolet light, and infrared light.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Malapert (crater)</span> Lunar surface depression caused by impact

Malapert is a lunar impact crater that lies near the south pole of the Moon, named for 17th century astronomer Charles Malapert. From the Earth this formation is viewed from the side, limiting the amount of detail that can be seen. The crater is also illuminated at very low angles, so that parts of the interior remain in almost constant darkness. The nearest craters of note are Cabeus to the west, and Shoemaker to the south-southeast and nearer to the south pole of the Moon.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">EXOSAT</span> Space observatory

The European X-ray Observatory Satellite (EXOSAT), originally named HELOS, was an X-ray telescope operational from May 1983 until April 1986 and in that time made 1780 observations in the X-ray band of most classes of astronomical object including active galactic nuclei, stellar coronae, cataclysmic variables, white dwarfs, X-ray binaries, clusters of galaxies, and supernova remnants.

This is a timeline of astronomy. It covers ancient, medieval, Renaissance-era, and finally modern astronomy.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Lunar south pole</span> Southernmost point on the Moon

The lunar south pole is the southernmost point on the Moon. It is of interest to scientists because of the occurrence of water ice in permanently shadowed areas around it. The lunar south pole region features craters that are unique in that the near-constant sunlight does not reach their interior. Such craters are cold traps that contain fossil records of hydrogen, water ice, and other volatiles dating from the early Solar System. In contrast, the lunar north pole region exhibits a much lower quantity of similarly sheltered craters.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Gamma-ray astronomy</span> Observational astronomy performed with gamma rays

Gamma-ray astronomy is a subfield of astronomy where scientists observe and study celestial objects and phenomena in outer space which emit cosmic electromagnetic radiation in the form of gamma rays, i.e. photons with the highest energies at the very shortest wavelengths. Radiation below 100 keV is classified as X-rays and is the subject of X-ray astronomy.

Moon Express is an American privately held company formed in 2010 by a group of Silicon Valley and space entrepreneurs. It had the goal of winning the $30 million Google Lunar X Prize, and of ultimately mining the Moon for natural resources of economic value. The company was not able to make a launch attempt to reach the Moon by March 31, 2018, the deadline for the prize.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Origins Space Telescope</span> Proposed far-infrared space observatory to study the early Universe

Origins Space Telescope (Origins) is a concept study for a far-infrared survey space telescope mission. A preliminary concept in pre-formulation, it was presented to the United States Decadal Survey in 2019 for a possible selection to NASA's large strategic science missions. Origins would provide an array of new tools for studying star formation and the energetics and physical state of the interstellar medium within the Milky Way using infrared radiation and new spectroscopic capabilities.

MoonLIGHT is a laser retroreflector developed as a collaboration primarily between the University of Maryland in the United States, and the Italian National Institute for Nuclear Physics - National Laboratories of Frascati (INFN-LNF) to complement and expand on the Lunar Laser Ranging experiment started with the Apollo Program in 1969. MoonLIGHT was planned to be launched in July 2020 as a secondary payload on the MX-1E lunar lander built by the private company Moon Express. However, as of February 2020, the launch of the MX-1E has been canceled. In 2018 INFN proposed to the European Space Agency (ESA) the MoonLIGHT Pointing Actuators (MPAc) project and was contracted by ESA to deliver it. MPAc is an INFN development for ESA, with auxiliary support by the Italian Space Agency (ASI) for prototyping work. In 2021, ESA agreed with NASA to launch MPAc with a Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS) mission. Nova-C, the lander on which MPAc will be integrated, is designed by Intuitive Machines and the landing site is Reiner Gamma. The expected launch date of the Nova-C mission carrying the instrument, IM-3, is in 2025.

Lunar Ultraviolet Cosmic Imager (LUCI) is a small planned telescope that will be landed on the Moon to scan the sky in near UV wavelengths. It is a technology demonstrator developed by the Indian Institute of Astrophysics, and it was planned to be one of several small payloads to be deployed by the commercial Z-01 lander developed by TeamIndus in partnership with OrbitBeyond. The mission was planned to be launched in 2020 as part of NASA's Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS). On 29 July 2019 OrbitBeyond announced that it would drop out of the CLPS contract with NASA, meaning that the 2020 launch was canceled and it is unknown whether the mission will ever take place.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Commercial Lunar Payload Services</span> NASA program contracting commercial transportation services to the Moon

Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS) is a NASA program to hire companies to send small robotic landers and rovers to the Moon. Most landing sites are near the lunar south pole where they will scout for lunar resources, test in situ resource utilization (ISRU) concepts, and perform lunar science to support the Artemis lunar program. CLPS is intended to buy end-to-end payload services between Earth and the lunar surface using fixed-price contracts. The program achieved the first landing on the moon by a commercial company in history with the IM-1 mission in 2024. The program was extended to add support for large payloads starting after 2025.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Intuitive Machines Nova-C</span> Lunar lander developed by Intuitive Machines

The Intuitive Machines Nova-C, or simply Nova-C, is a class of lunar landers designed by Intuitive Machines (IM) to deliver small payloads to the surface of the Moon. Intuitive Machines was one of three service providers awarded task orders in 2019 for delivery of NASA science payloads to the Moon. The IM-1 lunar lander, named Odysseus, was launched by a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket on 15 February 2024, reached lunar orbit on 21 February, and landed on the lunar surface on 22 February. This marked the inaugural Nova-C landing on the Moon and the first American spacecraft to perform a soft landing on the Moon in over 50 years. It is the first spacecraft to use methalox propulsion to navigate between the Earth and the Moon.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">IM-1</span> 2024 lunar landing mission

IM-1 was a lunar mission that was carried out in February 2024 jointly by a partnership between the NASA CLPS program and Intuitive Machines (IM), using an Nova-C lunar lander. IM named their lunar lander as its Odysseus lander. The Odysseus lander was the first commercial lunar lander to have successfully soft-landed on the Moon.

IM-2 is an upcoming lunar mission that will be carried out in 2024 by Intuitive Machines for NASA's CLPS program, using a Nova-C lunar lander. The company named this lander Athena. The mission aims to uncover the presence and amount of lunar water ice using PRIME-1, which consists of a drill and mass spectrometer. The lander will carry a Micro Nova Hopper, a drone that will utilize its neutron spectrometer in the PSR of the nearby Marston crater. If successful, this would provide the first measurement of hydrogen on the surface in the PSR, a key indicator of water.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Queqiao-1</span> Chinese lunar communications satellite

Queqiao relay satellite (Chinese: 鹊桥号中继卫星; pinyin: Quèqiáo hào zhōngjì wèixīng; lit. 'Magpie Bridge relay satellite'), is the first of the pair of communications relay and radio astronomy satellites for the Chinese Lunar Exploration Program. The China National Space Administration (CNSA) launched the Queqiao relay satellite on 20 May 2018 to a halo orbit around the Earth–Moon L2 Lagrangian point Queqiao is the first ever communication relay and radio astronomy satellite at this location.

Canadensys is a space systems and space vehicle development company in Ontario, Canada. Canadensys has a focus on micro- and nano-space technologies with 'smart' vehicle designs for planetary, orbital and terrestrial environments. It was founded in 2013.

References

  1. 1 2 "NASA Redirects Intuitive Machines' First Mission to the Lunar South Pole Region". Intuitive Machines. 6 February 2023. Retrieved 31 March 2023.
  2. ↑ "International Lunar Observatory Association". Kamuela, Hawaii.
  3. ↑ Accessible Lunar Exploration: Science & Communications from the Moon Archived 2018-03-20 at the Wayback Machine . Canadyensis Aerospace. 2018.
  4. ↑ Machines, Intuitive (2020-11-12). "ILOA-IM Announce Agreement for 2021 Lunar Landing and Milky Way Galaxy Center Imaging". Intuitive Machines. Retrieved 2022-04-08.
  5. 1 2 3 4 ILOA details its ILO-X lunar telescope, wants it on the Moon in 2015. Jon Fingas, Engadget. 28 May 2013.
  6. 1 2 3 4 Moon Express-built Telescope To Provide Lunar Perspective of Earth. Debra Werner, Space News 3 June 2013.
  7. ↑ Lunar Observatories Archived 2018-03-20 at the Wayback Machine . Robert S. French, Swinburne Astronomy Online.
  8. ↑ "ILOA Hawai'i – To the Galaxy, Moon and Every Place In-Between" . Retrieved 2022-04-08.
  9. ↑ "Space Age Publishing Company".
  10. ↑ International Lunar Observatory: ILO Mission Update (4th Quarter 2005). ILO Home Site.
  11. ↑ World's first mission to the Moon's south pole announced. PhysOrg, 19 July 2013.
  12. 1 2 3 International Lunar Observatory to be Established at Moon's South Pole in 2019 Archived 2018-03-20 at the Wayback Machine . Moon Express- Press Release. 21 July 2017.
  13. ↑ International Lunar Observatory Association, 4 Mission Update January 2018: ILOA & Galaxy Forum - 10 years on Archived 2018-03-20 at the Wayback Machine . ILOS, 20 January 2018.
  14. ↑ First lunar observatory for Moon's south pole in 2019. Kerry Hebden, The Space Journal. 24 July 2017.
  15. ↑ Realizing the International Lunar Observatory. ILO. 2004.
  16. ↑ Pietrobon, Steven. "New Zealand Launch Record (2009 to present)". Steven Pietrobon's Space Archive. Retrieved 12 March 2018.
  17. 1 2 Internatioinal Lunar Observatory to offer a new astrophysical perspective Archived 2023-12-04 at the Wayback Machine . Spaceflight Insider. Tonasz Nowakowski. 12 August 2017.
  18. ↑
  19. ↑ "The ILO Mission - ILOA Hawai'i". 2021-04-07. Retrieved 2024-03-04.
  20. ↑ "The ILO Mission – ILOA Hawai'i" . Retrieved 2022-04-08.
  21. ↑ figure 2: Optical Astronomy Payload Configuration. ILO.
  22. ↑ Canadensys: An Innovative New Canadian Space Company. The Commercial Space Blog . 5 October 2014.
  23. ↑ "The ILO Mission - ILOA Hawai'i". 2021-04-07. Retrieved 2024-03-04.
  24. ↑ ILO presentation - 2007.
  25. ↑ 'Maunakea World Park' Advanced by Hawaii Mayor Kim at ILOA Galaxy Forum Kona. PR Newswire. 13 April 2017.
  26. ↑ "ILO-X Precursor". ILOA.
  27. ↑ "News Release". ILOA. 30 January 2024.
  28. ↑ "Local Kealakehe Student Wins Hawai'i State-wide ILO-X Moon Camera Naming Contest - ILOA Hawai'i". 2022-11-14. Retrieved 2024-03-04.
  29. ↑ "ILO-X Wide Field-of-View Imager | ILO-X Moon Camera Naming Rights | International Lunar Observatory Association". BetterWorld. Retrieved 2024-03-04.
  30. ↑ "ILO-X Wide Field-of-View Instrument on the Moon Receives New Name "Lunar Codex" After Naming Rights Auction - ILOA Hawai'i". 2024-03-21. Retrieved 2024-07-08.
  31. ↑ "ILOA Receives First Moon Surface and Lunar Descent Images from ILO-X Aboard Intuitive Machines' IM-1 Nova-C Lander Odysseus - ILOA Hawai'i". 2024-02-29. Retrieved 2024-03-04.
  32. ↑ "ILOA Receives First Moon Surface and Lunar Descent Images from ILO-X Aboard Intuitive Machines' IM-1 Nova-C Lander Odysseus - ILOA Hawai'i". 2024-02-29. Retrieved 2024-03-04.
  33. ↑ "ILO-X Instruments Are on the Moon Surface, Teams Hope for Milky Way Galaxy and Lunar Images - ILOA Hawai'i". 2024-02-23. Retrieved 2024-03-04.
  34. 1 2 3 ILO — Astrophysics From the Moon's Advantages. Space Age Pub. 2017.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.