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NASA’s Curiosity Mars rover is now performing Sol 2962 tasks.

The rover is marching forward, reports Mark Salvatore, a planetary geologist at the University of Michigan. “Curiosity continues to make swift progress on her climb up Mt. Sharp. After ascending a relatively steep portion over the last few weeks, Curiosity is now on “’flatter’ ground and covering lots of ground with each drive,” he explains.

Interesting outcrops

Curiosity recently stopped to investigate the local bedrock and to acquire some long-distance and high-resolution images of the interesting outcrops that lie ahead.

The team selected four targets to analyze using the Chemistry and Camera (ChemCam) Laser Induced Breakdown Spectroscopy (LIBS) instrument to better characterize the chemistry of the local bedrock.

“Three of these targets are designed to characterize color variations in relatively smooth bedrock,” Salvatore adds, “while the final target was selected to investigate a more nodular piece of bedrock observed in front of the rover.

Two long-distance Mastcam color mosaics of some likely geologic transitions located ahead of the rover were planned, as well as a Mastcam multispectral observation of two large boulders to the east.

Compositional differences

“These multispectral observations will help the team to determine whether there are compositional differences between the boulders and the surrounding landscape, which could help to decipher the origin of the boulders and whether they represent more exotic geologic units than those currently being explored,” Salvatore reports. “In the coming days, Curiosity will stick around at this location as we gather more data and perform some routine rover maintenance before continuing her march to the east.”

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Here is the first look from NASA’s Lunar Reconnaissance orbiter (LRO) of China’s recent Moon lander – Chang’e-5.

Box indicates China’s  Chang’e-5 lander on the basaltic plains of Oceanus Procellarum (“Ocean of Storms”) on December 2, 2020.

The team supporting the LRO’s super-powerful LROC camera computed the coordinates of the lander to be 43.0576° N, 308.0839°E, –2570 m elevation, with an estimated accuracy of plus-or-minus 20 meters.

The lander is the bright spot in the center of the outline.

The areas around the lander has been brightened due to the descent engine plume residue on the surface which is similar to what has been observed at other landing sites, according to LROC-central at ASU.

 

 

China’s Chang’e-5 lunar sample return capsule is preparing for transit back to Earth. The mission’s lander/ascender spent about 19 hours snagging samples from the Moon’s surface on Thursday and completed the country’s first-ever takeoff from an extraterrestrial body.

Carrying its precious cargo of lunar collectibles, the ascender module of the Chang’e-5 lander spacecraft powered itself into Moon orbit to rendezvous and dock with other mission modules.

“It took six minutes for the module to enter into the lunar orbit after taking off and seven minutes later, it unfolded its solar panels. It is impossible for us to intervene during such a short period of time if anything happens. So, we have made special designs to enable the module to make decisions on its own,” said Xing Zhuoyi, a designer of the Chang’e-5 probe from the China Academy of Space Technology (CAST) under the China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation.

The ascender module will dock with the orbiter/returner modules, transferring the lunar sample container into those elements.

“After the docking, the combination of orbiter and returner will stay in orbit for a few days. It will be waiting for a specific window period that allows the combination to return to the Earth, said Xing in a China Central Television (CCTV) interview.

Skip re-entry

In depositing the sample-carrying capsule into the Earth’s atmosphere, designers have developed a skip reentry method mimicking a skipping stone to lower the craft’s speed and protect it during the scorching reentry.

“The speed is too high because of the reentry at the second cosmic velocity. So we need to reduce the speed through the inflatable aerodynamic decelerator,” said Shu Yan, chief designer of the Chang’e-5 mission. “By this way, the returner can re-enter the atmosphere at a lower speed, like the Shenzhou spacecraft, and successfully return to the Earth.”

The lunar rocks and soil gathered by Chang’e 5’s lander/ascender combination are scheduled to parachute into a preset site in North China’s Inner Mongolia autonomous region in mid-December.

Experimental spacecraft

China launched an experimental spacecraft on October 24, 2014, to test technologies used for the Chang’e-5 mission.

Comprising a re-entry capsule and a service module, that craft flew halfway around the Moon. After the re-entry and service capsules separated, the re-entry vehicle approached Earth’s atmosphere at about 11.2 km per second.

 

That test return capsule touched down at the designated landing area in Siziwang Banner, north China’s Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region, on November 1, 2014.

The service module flew back to orbit the moon for further tests and reached the L2 point of the Earth-Moon system to conduct experiments.

 

 

Go to these newly issued CCTV videos detailing the Chang’e-5 mission:

https://youtu.be/mBv-QoOkaBk

https://youtu.be/hB3UPLm356U

Before China’s Chang’e-5 ascender blasted off into Moon orbit today, a five-star red flag was deployed on the Moon’s surface.

According to China Central Television (CCTV) this is the first time that China has realized the “independent display” of the five-star red flag on the lunar landscape.  

The five-star red flag weighs only 1 kilogram and can still “maintain its true colors” under a temperature difference of plus or minus 150 degrees Celsius.

“Fabric version”

A lunar flag display system consisted of three parts: the lunar flag, the compression release device, and a small pyrotechnic deployment mechanism – and is about half a meter long.

Unlike the five-star red flag on China’s earlier lunar vehicles — Chang’e-3, Chang’e-4, and Yutu lunar rover that used spraying methods — the “fabric version” of the five-star red flag on Chang’e-5 is a real flag.

The five-star red flag that unfolded in the form of a scroll is relatively flat and was designed to be wrinkle-proof.

The scientific research team spent more than a year in selecting materials, and finally selected 20 or 30 fiber materials. A new type of composite material was chosen so that the five-star red flag can withstand the harsh environment of the Moon and does not fade, color, or deform.

“Although this is just a thin five-star red flag, it has a very high technological content,” said Ma Wei, the commander of the five-star red flag display system project, according to CCTV.

China’s Chang’e-5 ascender vehicle has blasted off from the Moon, successfully positioning its cargo of lunar samples for rendezvous, docking, and transfer to an awaiting orbiter/returner craft.

China Central Television (CCTV) reports at 23:10 on December 3 (Beijing time), the 3000 newton-thrust engine of the Chang’e-5 ascender worked for about 6 minutes and successfully hurled the ascender carrying the samples to the scheduled orbit around the Moon.

Prior to liftoff of the ascender from the Moon, a Chinese flag was deployed from the lander.

Moon-Earth transfer window

After takeoff, the ascender reportedly went through three stages of vertical ascent, attitude adjustment and orbit injection, and entered the scheduled orbit around the Moon. 

Subsequently, the ascender will rendezvous and dock with the orbital assembly waiting around the Moon and transfer the lunar sample to the returner, which will wait for a suitable Moon-Earth transfer window to prepare for its return to Earth.

According to one source, docking with the orbiter will happen on December 6, Beijing Time.

 

https://twitter.com/i/status/1334523926404362240

China’s Chang’e-5’s ascender is ready for departure from the Moon later today, hauling into lunar orbit a cache of specimens picked up and packaged from the Ocean of Storms.

The processes of drilling and packing rocks and soil from beneath the lunar surface finished at 4:53 am on December 2, the China National Space Administration (CNSA) said, and the mechanical arm was still gathering surface samples.

Immediately after the successful lunar touchdown, the Chang’e-5 hardware began the collection work using two methods: drilling and surface collecting. Hauling back to Earth some 4.4 pounds (2 kilograms) of Moon specimens was the goal of the Chang’e-5 mission.

The packaging and sealing work was performed on the Moon to ensure intact samples are not affected by the external environment when returning to Earth.

Smoother than expected

Ren Junjie, a researcher at the National Space Administration’s Lunar Exploration and Space Engineering Center said the entire lunar surface sampling process went smoother than anticipated. In the entire meter sampling process, a dozen samples were carried out. The container for the meter sampling was filled, and the sampling task was finished ahead of schedule.

 

The Chang’e-5 lunar lander is equipped with multiple payloads including a landing camera, panorama camera, lunar regolith penetrating radar and lunar mineralogical spectrometer, which detects lunar surface topography and mineral composition, as well as the Moon’s shallow subsurface structure.

 

Before the sample drilling process, the lunar regolith penetrating radar analyzed the subsurface structure in the sampling area, offering data reference for sampling.

According to one report, the Chang’e-5 lunar probe was also to directly measure charged lunar dust, expected to reveal the secret of floating lunar dust.

 

 

Express package

After the ascender speeds into lunar orbit using its 3,000-newton-thrust, it will merge with the orbiter and returner combination and deliver the “express package” of lunar specimens to them. The orbiter/returner capsule is in lunar orbit at an average altitude of about 124 miles (200 kilometers).

The orbiter-reentry combination capsule will then return to Earth orbit, where the pair will break up, and the reentry capsule skims the Earth’s atmosphere to slow down. This series of complicated maneuvers leads to return of the capsule in mid-December, to a preset landing site in the Inner Mongolia autonomous region.

High hopes

Peng Jing, deputy chief designer of Chang’e-5 probe with the China Academy of Space Technology, said they hold high hopes that the samples collected will open new perspectives for lunar scientists.

“China’s scientists said it requires samples from different (geologic) ages to piece together the full history of the Moon,” Peng told China Central Television (CCTV). “Analysis has shown that the samples we could gather from the designated northwest area of the Ocean of Storms are rather new. Together with the more ancient samples, we could gain a better knowledge of the formation and evolution of the Moon,” he said.

Gao Lei, an official from the China National Space Administration’s lunar exploration program, said the Chang’e-5 mission technologies will also prove to be helpful in similar future operations.

“One of our main missions of planet exploration is sample collecting and their usage. So I think the technologies that we’ve used this time will prove useful for other sample-collecting missions in the future, whether it’s on the Moon, Mars, or other planets,” Gao said.

Go to these new videos for Chang’e-5 mission progress:

http://pv.news.cctvplus.com/2020/1203/8168047_Preview_9665.mp4

https://youtu.be/FMd6ltJi06A

Hong Kong University Makes Key Contributions to China’s Lunar Mission

NASA’s Curiosity Mars rover is now carrying out Sol 2959 tasks.

A recent drive by the wheeled robot of roughly 167 feet (51 meters) placed it in front of good outcrop to study, reports Lauren Edgar, a planetary geologist at USGS Astrogeology Science Center in Flagstaff, Arizona.

Curiosity’s plan involved a “touch-and-go” – an opportunity to do short duration contact science before getting back on the road, Edgar adds. The rover was to acquire Alpha Particle X-Ray Spectrometer (APXS) and Mars Hand Lens Imager (MAHLI) observations of the target “Edinburrie” to systematically characterize bedrock as the robot transitions between stratigraphic units.

Drive to the southeast

Then Curiosity is to stow its robotic arm, Edgar explains, and have a short science block which contains Chemistry and Camera (ChemCam) and Mastcam observations of a nodular bedrock target named “Bruggs” and a Mastcam tau to monitor dust in the atmosphere.

Curiosity will then continue making progress to the southeast with a drive of roughly 98 feet (30 meters), Edgar adds, towards a bright blocky area seen on the horizon,” Edgar reports. After the drive the rover will acquire imaging to help with context and targeting in an upcoming plan.

 

 

Also planned is another autonomously selected ChemCam Autonomous Exploration for Gathering Increased Science (AEGIS) target, and a ChemCam calibration activity. And last but not least, scientists will take a standard Mars Descent Imager (MARDI) photo to keep track of the changing terrain beneath the rover, Edgar concludes.

Following its December 1^st lunar landing, China’s Chang’e-5 robotic probe has collected a cargo of Moon samples, the China National Space Administration (CNSA) announced Wednesday.

The lander-ascender combination of Chang’e-5 finished the tasks of Moon sample drilling and packaging at 4:53 am Wednesday utilizing two methods of sampling, including using drills and a mechanical arm to gather specimens.

About 2 kilograms of samples are expected to be collected and sealed in a container in what scientists have described as a long “sausage-like package.”

Chang’e 5 is expected to work for about two days in a region to the north of Mons Rümker, a mountain overlooking a vast lunar mare called Oceanus Procellarum, or the Ocean of Storms, on the western edge of the Moon’s near side.

Positional adjustment

When the lander-ascender reached an altitude of 1.6 miles (2.5 kilometers) it conducted a rapid positional adjustment and continued approaching the lunar surface.

During the engine-assisted process, cameras on the lander-ascender took pictures of the landing site and transmitted them to computers to identify possible hazards on the surface such as large rocks so the craft could maneuver to avoid them.

The lander-ascender suspended its descent when it was about 328 feet (100 meters) from the Moon and hovered for a short time to carry out accurate detection of obstacles before continuing to descend at a slower, steady speed.

Next phase

After the collection and packing operations are completed, a 3,000-newton-thrust engine on the ascender will lift the hardware carrying the specimens to rendezvous and dock with the reentry module. It will transfer the lunar samples to the module.

At the proper time, the returner will then separate from the orbiter and carry the collectibles back to Earth, landing under parachute in north China’s Inner Mongolia.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

To relive the Chang’e-5 mission to date, view this collection of videos at:

https://youtu.be/Py5cndfk3Jw

https://youtu.be/VS9zr6MrCiM

https://youtu.be/C5Bg0Xpz-ek

Also, go to: Simulation facilities applied to prepare for Chang’e-5 mission on Moon

China’s Chang’e-5 spacecraft successfully landed on the near side of the Moon late Tuesday and sent back images, the China National Space Administration (CNSA) announced.

According to China news groups, the spacecraft landed at the preselected landing area near 51.8 degrees west longitude and 43.1 degrees north latitude, citing a CNSA statement.

Chang’e-5 reportedly touched down on the north of the Mons Rumker in Oceanus Procellarum, also known as the Ocean of Storms, on the near side of the Moon.

Status checks

Under ground-control, the lander carried out a series of status checks and settings, preparing for around 48 hours of work on the surface of the Moon.

If all goes according to plan, the lander craft will stash about 2 kilograms of lunar samples and seal them in a container.

Following this specimen-stashing, the Chang’e-5’s ascender will take off and dock with the orbiter-returner combination in Moon orbit.

After the samples are transferred to the returner, the ascender will separate from the orbiter-returner.

The returner is then to transfer the lunar collectibles back to Earth, landing at Siziwang Banner in north China’s Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region.

Kudos

The successful landing of Chang’e-5 was underscored by several U.S. space leaders.

NASA’s Thomas Zurbuchen, Associate Administrator for the Science Mission Directorate noted post-landing: “Congratulations to China on the successful landing of Chang’e 5. This is no easy task. When the samples collected on the Moon are returned to Earth, we hope everyone will benefit from being able to study this precious cargo that could advance the international science community.”

Similarly, Clive Neal, a lunar scientist from Notre Dame said: “Congratulations to our friends and colleagues in China on what has been achieved so far. We all look forward to seeing the first samples returned from the Moon in 44 years. These will represent the first lunar samples returned in the 21st century – and I hope they will not be the last!”

 

Go to landing video at New China TV:

https://youtu.be/PsDX5eZcmks

China’s Chang’e-5 lunar mission — the country’s first attempt to retrieve samples automatically from an extraterrestrial body – is ready for a landing.

The Chang’e-5 probe’s lander and ascender separated from its orbiter and returner at 4:40 a.m. Beijing time on Monday, according to the China National Space Administration (CNSA) on the same day.

Sealed deal

Getting down and dirty on the lunar surface, then collect Moon samples for return to Earth, is a complex affair.

“We have never done a whole process of taking and sealing samples,” said Peng Jing, deputy chief designer of the Chang’e-5 probe system of China Academy of Space Technology, also a scientist with China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation (CASC).

Peng told China Central Television (CCTV) this aspect of the work mainly depends on several complicated structures including drilling, robotically scooping up rocks and regolith on the lunar surface, and then place specimens in a high vacuum sealing device.

“If the air enters the sealed device during this process or during the samples’ transportation, it might pollute the samples,” Peng said.

Lunar liftoff

Another tricky part of the Chang’e-5 mission is the liftoff from the Moon of the ascender.

“The main difficulty is that when we first land on the Moon, we would not know how the lander performs beforehand. Besides, the most crucial part during the launch is the fact that the targeted direction needs to be really precise. Only when we have especially designed such a direction and the ascender has entered the target orbit, can it be able to rendezvous with the orbiter-returner combination and conduct further flying processes,” Peng said.

Autonomous operations

The ascender will autonomously dock with the orbiter-returner combination and poses another tough challenge.

“We need to precisely anticipate the location and speed of the two spacecraft flying at the lunar orbit. Because the probes don’t match in size, our ascender weighs just around 300 to 400 kilograms during docking, while the combination weighs nearly 2,000 kilograms. Any error could knock off the smaller spacecraft, and that would make the docking job much more difficult than before,” Peng said. He added that the docking has a rather high requirement on accuracy, with an error range less than five centimeters.

If all goes according to plan, a successful Chang’e-5 mission would parachute back to Earth roughly 4 pounds (2 kilograms) of lunar collectibles, landing in Siziwang Banner in Inner Mongolia, north China.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Go to this CCTV video detailing the Chang’e-5 mission at:

https://youtu.be/0iMY8SVXmBQ