The robotic mission provides China a historic first and will assist unlock mysteries of the Moon’s formation.
The Chang’e 6 lander sits on the Moon on this picture taken by the Jinchan mini-rover. Credit score: CNSA
On June 25, 2024, China’s Chang’e 6 mission got here to an finish when a reentry capsule touched down within the Siziwang Banner Province in Mongolia. The capsule contained actually treasured cargo: slightly below 2 kilograms (4.4 kilos) of lunar samples from the farside of the Moon. No mission had ever retrieved materials from the farside of the Moon earlier than, giving China a historic first and furthering the momentum of their lunar program.
From a modest begin 20 years in the past, China’s lunar program has slowly grown to turn into a juggernaut of analysis and technological innovation, watched with some extent of wariness by NASA, Japan, and the European Area Company. In contrast to NASA, which is a civilian company, the Chinese language area program is intently associated to, and to some extent built-in with, its nationwide navy forces. Starting with lunar orbiters and progressing to lunar landers and rovers, this system has now reached the purpose of with the ability to mount a sequence of sample-return missions of exceptional complexity. Chang’e 6 comes on the heels of 2020’s profitable Chang’e 5 mission, which returned samples from the close to aspect of the Moon.
Chang’e 6’s epic voyage
Chang’e 6 launched on May 3 of this year aboard a heavy-lift Long March 5 rocket — China’s equal to a Delta 4 or Falcon 9 rocket — after which proceeded by way of a number of discrete phases. Getting into a extremely elliptical lunar orbit (measuring 124 by 236,000 miles [200 by 380,000 km]) on Could 8, Chang’e 6 spent about 20 days mapping the lunar floor in quest of a suitable touchdown location whereas on the similar time slowly circularizing its orbit.
On June 1, the stacked lander and ascent stage separated from the orbiter and, after a 15-minute descent, touched down autonomously on the farside of the Moon. The lander was capable of acquire lunar floor and core samples, all of the whereas being photographed by a mini-rover it had carried to the floor. Launched to trundle a number of meters away from the lander, the mini-rover, referred to as Jinchan and weighing solely round 11 kilos (5 kilograms), captured some actually breathtaking photographs of the principle lander, sitting on the lunar floor and flying a Chinese language flag.
Associated: Exploring the Moon: China’s Chang’e missions
As soon as secured, the samples lifted off from the lunar floor aboard the ascent module, which the Chinese language name an “ascender.” The ascender deployed photo voltaic panels and made a number of changes to its orbit across the Moon earlier than it rendezvoused with the orbiter. After the fragile rendezvous and docking was accomplished, the lunar samples had been internally transferred to the so-called “returner” module. As soon as this was full, the ascender was discarded. The orbiter and returner circled the Moon for roughly 14 extra days till the correct window opened up for a return to the Earth. At this level the orbiter/returner advanced fired its engine and headed residence.
Round 3,000 miles (5,000 kilometers) from Earth, the returner module indifferent and started its reentry. Trying very very like a miniature Soyuz descent module, the returner carried out a non-ballistic reentry, also referred to as a skip reentry. This allowed the returner to burn off velocity and dissipate vitality because it dipped into and out of the environment earlier than making its ultimate plunge to the floor for a delicate touchdown beneath a parachute. The returner module was shortly reached by restoration forces after landing.
A coveted scientific bounty
The samples had been flown to the China Academy of Area Expertise in Beijing and, after a short ceremony, handed over to scientists. The farside of the Moon is of explicit curiosity to lunar scientists as it’s distinctly totally different than the nearside, which is dominated by volcanic plains referred to as maria. The nearside is closely coated in maria, whereas the farside has just about none to talk of. The explanations for this disparity between the close to and much sides of the Moon are at the moment up for debate. Rocks from the farside of the Moon even have a unique chemical composition than these on the nearside. Scientists hope that the samples returned from the Chang’e 6 mission will deal with a few of these discrepancies.
As up to now, Chinese language scientists will get the primary crack at learning the returned samples. It might be years earlier than China permits worldwide researchers to use for entry to them; samples recovered by Chang’e 5 in December 2020 weren’t provided to worldwide labs till August 2023, and NASA didn’t give its scientists a inexperienced mild to use till December of that yr. (Beneath U.S. legislation, NASA is banned from collaborating bilaterally with China; to be granted an exception, the company needed to certify to Congress that there was no know-how switch or safety threat in learning the Moon rocks.)
The success of the Chang’e 6 mission places China one step nearer to its final aim: placing Chinese language astronauts (“taikonauts”) on the Moon. China plans to sometime have a lunar outpost close to the south pole and hopes to hold out a crewed touchdown by 2030. Whereas NASA directors are eager to state that they aren’t in an area race with China, the U.S. is angling to return astronauts to the Moon by way of the Artemis program earlier than China makes its personal first touchdown, and the 2 area companies are clearly maintaining a tally of one another. Time will inform who units foot on the Moon subsequent.
