BEIJING (CHINA) – China plans to initiate an unmanned spacecraft to the moon this week to retrieve lunar rocks. This is the first attempt by any nation to retrieve samples from Earth’s natural satellite since the 1970s.
The Chang’e-5 probe, named after the ancient Chinese goddess of the moon, aims to collect material that will give scientists more clarity about the moon’s origins and formation. The mission will be a test of China’s ability to remotely acquire samples from space, ahead of more complex missions.
If it becomes successful, the mission will make it the third country to have retrieved lunar samples, after the United States and the Soviet Union.
In the Apollo programme, which first put men on the moon, the United States had 12 astronauts landing over six flights from 1969 to 1972, bringing back 382 kg (842 pounds) of rocks and soil.
The Soviet Union had in place three robotic sample return missions, which were successful in the 1970s. The last, the Luna 24, retrieved 170.1 grams (6 ounces) of samples in 1976 from Mare Crisium, or “Sea of Crises”.
China’s probe, scheduled to launch in coming days, will aim to collect 2 kg (4 1/2 pounds) of samples in a previously unvisited area in a massive lava plain known as Oceanus Procellarum, or “Ocean of Storms”.
James Head, a planetary scientist at Brown University, said, “The Apollo-Luna sample zone of the moon, while critical to our understanding, was undertaken in an area that comprises far less than half the lunar surface.”
Head said, “Lunar scientists have been advocating for robotic sample return missions to these many different critical areas in order to address a host of fundamental questions remaining from earlier exploration.”
The Chang’e-5 mission may help provide answers to questions such as the duration until which the moon remained volcanically active in its interior and when its magnetic field dissipated.
Once in the moon’s orbit, it aims to deploy a pair of vehicles to the surface: a lander will drill into the ground. It will then transfer its soil and rock samples to an ascender which will lift off and dock with an orbiting module.
If this is successful, the samples will be switched to a return capsule that will return them to Earth.
Within the next decade, China plans to set up a robotic base station for conducting unmanned exploration in the south polar region.
It is to be developed through the Chang’e-6, 7 and 8 missions through the 2020s and expanded through the 2030s ahead of manned landings.
China plans to retrieve samples from Mars by 2030.