NASAs Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland has been given the nod to lead a robotic lunar mission in 2008 -- a key step in President George W. Bushs recently announced space vision strategy.
The lunar reconnaissance orbiter would likely be geared to investigate the potential for water ice trapped at the Moons poles. This type of investigation may involve powerful radar to scan the always darkened craters, thought by some scientists to contain bountiful quantities of water ice.
Water ice is believed to have been brought to the Moon by impacting comets. Both NASAs Lunar Prospector and the Pentagons Clementine spacecraft offered tantalizing data interpreted by some experts as indicative of water ice deposits.
A number of alterative, fast-track approaches are under review at the Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC) to build the lunar orbiter. A newly formed GSFC lunar study team held their first meeting Thursday to begin scoping out how best to move the project forward.
Series of robotic lunar missions
President Bush has directed NASA to undertake lunar exploration activities to enable sustained human and robotic exploration of Mars and more distant destinations in the solar system.
Starting no later than 2008, the Bush plan calls for initiating a series of robotic missions to the Moon to prepare for and support future human exploration activities. A follow-on robotic lunar lander is also slated for 2009.
The White House space directive states that the first extended human expedition to the lunar surface could occur as early as 2015, but no later than the year 2020.
In reestablishing and reenergizing NASAs Moon program, the White House envisions lunar exploration activities to further science, and to develop and test new approaches, technologies, and systems, including use of lunar and other space resources, to support sustained human space exploration to Mars and other destinations.
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