Lunar Development

Exploration without Science is Tourism

From the  AMERICAN ASTRONOMICAL SOCIETY STATEMENT ON THE VISION FOR SPACE EXPLORATION

The American Astronomical Society urges that a vigorous, focused program of scientific research form the core of the implementation of the Vision for Space Exploration. The President’s initiative for the civilian space program places emphasis on exploration of the Moon, Mars, and beyond by humans and robots. Science is exploration, whether it involves directly sampling the surface of Mars, or gathering in the faint and ancient light of distant galaxies. Exploration without science is tourism.

Any NASA funded exploration should be strongly science based.

There seems to be a hostility towards science based exploration on the Web and I find it highly disturbing. I have nothing against space tourism as long as the tourist are paying their own way. The US tax payers should not fund space tourism especially not in the name of exploration.

I totally agree with this statement the difference betwen tourism and exploration is data gathering. Gathering of data includes making, maps, taking pictures and taking samples and is not necessarily done by scienctists but if exploration is not about gathering data it is a waste.

European Lunar Observatory Workshop

The Europeans are looking at constructing lunar observatories. I am glad to see that the moon's potential for a location for science is beginning to be taken seriously.

Still Usefull After All These Years

Scientists are planning to use the mirrors placed by Apollo 11 on the Moon to measure the Moon's orbit to great accuracy to see if there are kinks in gravity over great distances. This is an attempt to try to explain away the dark matter problem , since over large distances gravity seems weaker than it should be.

Tom Murphy, Chris Stubbs and Eric Adelberger at the University of Washington plan to use more precise laser equipment to measure the Moon's path.

It is a measure of how important the Apollo program was that 35 years latter the equipment left there is still being used. Imagine what we could do if we planned to use the Moon for scientific research.

NRO to put instrument on LRO

It only seems fitting that the National Reconnaissance Office would be part of the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter.
In NASA and NRO to Team-Up on Lunar Spacecraft the cooperation was announced. "The cooperation will focus on developing a miniature synthetic aperture radar sensor that the lunar probe will use to develop detailed maps of the Moon’s surface, Rustan said in a Jan. 25 interview.The cooperation will focus on developing a miniature synthetic aperture radar sensor that the lunar probe will use to develop detailed maps of the Moon’s surface, Rustan said in a Jan. 25 interview."

100 Meter Telescopes on the Moon

A Pristine View of the Universe... from the Moon Roger Angel has been considering how to build a telescope on the Moon. The Moon is the perfect location for liquid paraboloc Mirror according to Angel. His team is working on how to build a 100m mirror for a lunar telescope, this would be 40times the size of Hubble's mirror. Angel thinks the Moon is the ideal place to study small areas of the sky intensively, which has been a very productive aproach lately. Also the North pole may be better than the south pole for astronomy.

International Lunar Observatory has New Web Site

Space Age Publishing and Space Dev have been working on the International Lunar Observatory. This is a very worthy effort as it illustrates the value of the Moon for astronomy.