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Lunar exploration -

Today, lunar exploration is nothing new. Starting with the Apollo missions of the 1960s and '70s, astronauts have been exploring the Moon for decades.

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Unchartered territory -

Until 2023, however, there was one area of the Moon that astronauts still had not ventured: its enigmatic South Pole.

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Difficult to reach -

The lunar South Pole is, for various reasons, difficult to reach. The Apollo spacecraft of the 20th century, for example, mainly touched down near to the Moon’s equator.

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Chandrayaan-3 -

In 2023, however, the lander from India’s Chandrayaan-3 mission successfully touched down 370 miles (600 km) from the lunar South Pole.

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Important step -

The Chandrayaan-3 lander got closer than any other spacecraft has been to the lunar South Pole, and its suitcase-sized rover made some important observations.

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Future plans -

In 2025, NASA plans to continue mankind’s exploration of the lunar South Pole by landing astronauts there as part of its Artemis III mission.

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Making progress -

These missions represent a huge step forward for mankind’s exploration of the Moon, not least because multiple spacecraft have failed to land on its South Pole in the past.

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Luna-25 -

Just two days before the successful landing of the Indian spacecraft, for example, the Russian Luna-25 failed to land because it spun out of control and crashed.

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2019 mission -

Prior to that, in 2019, a previous Indian mission failed when the spacecraft failed to land safely near the area targeted by Chandrayaan-3.

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Craters and trenches -

The reason it’s so difficult for spacecraft to land on the lunar South Pole is that it’s full of craters and deep trenches. Various Apollo missions have also failed to land there.

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Why it's so interesting -

Scientists are nonetheless fascinated by the lunar South Pole because they believe it may be home to an abundance of ice, much of which is made of water.

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Shallow axis of rotation -

The Moon rotates on a shallow axis, which means that some of the craters at its poles never see sunlight.

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Low temperatures -

Couple this with the low temperatures in these locations, and scientists believe that the presence of ice, either on the surface of the Moon or mixed into the soil, is very likely.

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Lessons about the past -

The possibility of finding ice on the Moon is exciting for a number of different reasons. Firstly, it may have a lot to teach us about the distant past.

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Ancient water ice - Indeed, pockets of ancient water ice may be able to provide a record of lunar volcanoes, as well as the origins of oceans.

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Implications for future exploration -

The discovery of water on the Moon, provided it exists in sufficient quantities, may also have important implications for lunar exploration.

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Source of drinking water -

Indeed, it could provide a source of drinking water for astronauts, which is an ongoing challenge, as well as help cool important equipment.

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Breaking it down -

Astronauts may even be able to break the water down in order to produce hydrogen for fuel and oxygen to breathe. This, in turn, could support missions to Mars or lunar mining.

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Long-term theory -

The idea that there may be ice on the Moon is nothing new. In fact, scientists have speculated about the existence of lunar water since before the Apollo missions of the 1960s.

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20th-century samples -

However, when the Apollo crews returned samples for analysis in the late 1960s and early '70s, they appeared to be dry.

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Turning point -

It was only when researchers from Brown University revisited those samples in 2008 that the excitement really began to build.

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Hydrogen in volcanic glass -

When the Brown researchers looked at the samples, they found hydrogen stored inside tiny beads of volcanic glass.

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NASA in 2009 -

This was suggestive of water on the Moon, and, sure enough, in 2009 a NASA instrument detected water on the Moon’s surface.

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Striking water -

Later in the same year, another NASA instrument that hit the South Pole found water ice below the Moon’s surface.

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Key discovery in 2023 -

The main discovery made by the Chandrayaan-3 rover when the mission landed in 2023 was related to the surface temperature of the Moon.

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Temperature drop -

By burying its sensors into the lunar soil as it roamed around, the Pragyaan rover was able to reveal a sharp drop in temperature just below the Moon’s surface.

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Details -

Indeed, at the surface the rover measured a temperature of around 50°C (120°F). Just 80 mm (3 inches) below this, however, the recorded temperature was -10°C (14°F).

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Unexpected -

This data was already interesting to scientists, who had not expected such a dramatic drop in temperature below the lunar South Pole’s surface.

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Going forward -

However, it is the data provided by future missions that experts are most excited about. In particular, they are keen to learn more about the South Pole’s permanently shadowed regions (PSRs).

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Seriously old ice -

These regions are angled in such a way that the Sun’s rays never reach their insides, meaning that they have potentially been storing ice for billions of years.

Sources: (BBC) (NASA) (The World Economic Forum)

See also: Earth has a second moon

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