• Journal of Astronomy and Space Sciences
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• v.36 no.3
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• pp.213-223
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• 2019

This paper analyzes delta-Vs to maintain an extremely low altitude on the Moon and investigates the possibilities of performing a CubeSat mission. To formulate the station-keeping (SK) problem at an extremely low altitude, current work has utilized real-flight performance proven software, the Systems Tool Kit Astrogator by Analytical Graphics Inc. With a high-fidelity force model, properties of SK maneuver delta-Vs to maintain an extremely low altitude are successfully derived with respect to different sets of reference orbits; of different altitudes as well as deadband limits. The effect of the degree and order selection of lunar gravitational harmonics on the overall SK maneuver strategy is also analyzed. Based on the derived SK maneuver delta-V costs, the possibilities of performing a CubeSat mission are analyzed with the expected mission lifetime by applying the current flight-proven miniaturized propulsion system performances. Moreover, the lunar surface coverage as well as the orbital characteristics of a candidate reference orbit are discussed. As a result, it is concluded that an approximately 15-kg class CubeSat could maintain an orbit (30-50 km reference altitude having ${\pm}10km$ deadband limits) around the Moon for 1-6 months and provide almost full coverage of the lunar surface.

• Journal of Astronomy and Space Sciences
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• v.26 no.2
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• pp.171-186
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• 2009

Various Earth-Moon transfer trajectories are designed and analyzed to prepare the future Korea's Lunar missions. Minimum fuel trajectory solutions are obtained for the departure year of 2017, 2020, 2022, and every required mission phases are analyzed from Earth departure to the final lunar mission orbit. N-body equations of motion are formulated which include the gravitational effect of the Sun, Earth and Moon. In addition, accelerations due to geopotential harmonics, Lunar J2 and solar radiation pressures are considered. Impulsive high thrust is assumed as the main thrusting method of spacecraft with launcher capability of KSLV-2 which is planned to be developed. For the method of injecting a spacecraft into a trans Lunar trajectory, both direct shooting from circular parking orbit and shooting from the multiple elliptical intermediate orbits are adapted, and their design results are compared and analyzed. In addition, spacecraft's visibility from Deajeon ground station are constrained to see how they affect the magnitude of TLI(Trans Lunar Injection) maneuver. The results presented in this paper includes launch opportunities, required optimal maneuver characteristics for each mission phase as well as the trajectory characteristics and numerous related parameters. It is confirmed that the final mass of Korean lunar explorer strongly depends onto the initial parking orbit's altitude and launcher's capability, rather than mission start time.

• The Bulletin of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.37 no.2
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• pp.120.1-120.1
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• 2012

The Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) launched on June 16, 2009 has six experiments including of the Cosmic Ray Telescope for the Effects of Radiation (CRaTER) onboard. The CRaTER instrument characterizes the radiation environment to be experienced by humans during future lunar missions. The CRaTER instrument measures the effects of ionizing energy loss in matter specifically in silicon solid-state detectors due to penetrating solar energetic protons (SEP) and galactic cosmic rays (GCRs) after interactions with tissue-equivalent plastic (TEP), a synthetic analog of human tissue. The CRaTER instrument houses a compact and highly precise microdosimeter. It measures dose rates below one micro-Rad/sec in silicon in lunar radiation environment. Forbush decrease (FD) event is the sudden decrease of GCR flux. We use the data of cosmic ray and dose rates observed by the CRaTER instrument. We also use the CME list of STEREO SECCHI inner, outer coronagraph and the interplanetary CME data of the ACE/MAG instrument.We examine the origins and the characteristics of the FD-like events in lunar radiation environment. We also compare these events with the FD events on the Earth. We find that whenever the FD events are recorded at ground Neutron Monitor stations, the FD-like events also occur on the lunar environments. The flux variation amplitude of FD-like events on the Moon is approximately two times larger than that of FD events on the Earth. We compare time profiles of GCR flux with of the dose rate of FD-like events in the lunar environment. We figure out that the distinct FD-like events correspond to dose rate events in the CRaTER on lunar environment during the event period.

• Journal of Astronomy and Space Sciences
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• v.28 no.3
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• pp.203-216
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• 2011

To prepare for a future Korean lunar orbiter mission, semi-optimal lunar capture orbits using finite thrust are designed and analyzed. Finite burn delta-V losses during lunar capture sequence are also analyzed by comparing those with values derived with impulsive thrusts in previous research. To design a hypothetical lunar capture sequence, two different intermediate capture orbits having orbital periods of about 12 hours and 3.5 hours are assumed, and final mission operation orbit around the Moon is assumed to be 100 km altitude with 90 degree of inclination. For the performance of the on-board thruster, three different performances (150 N with $I_{sp}$ of 200 seconds, 300 N with $I_{sp}$ of 250 seconds, 450 N with $I_{sp}$ of 300 seconds) are assumed, to provide a broad range of estimates of delta-V losses. As expected, it is found that the finite burn-arc sweeps almost symmetric orbital portions with respect to the perilune vector to minimize the delta-Vs required to achieve the final orbit. In addition, a difference of up to about 2% delta-V can occur during the lunar capture sequences with the use of assumed engine configurations, compared to scenarios with impulsive thrust. However, these delta-V losses will differ for every assumed lunar explorer's on-board thrust capability. Therefore, at the early stage of mission planning, careful consideration must be made while estimating mission budgets, particularly if the preliminary mission studies were assumed using impulsive thrust. The results provided in this paper are expected to lead to further progress in the design field of Korea's lunar orbiter mission, particularly the lunar capture sequences using finite thrust.

• Publications of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.38 no.2
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• pp.59-73
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• 2023

Since the farside of the moon is a place to avoid artificial radio frequency interference (RFI) created by human civilization, it is a most suitable place for searching technosignature, which are signs of technological civilization in the universe, in the radio band. The RFI is a factor that makes the study of searching technosignature quite complicated because it is difficult to distinguish between technological signals produced by human and extraterrestrial civilizations. In this paper, we review why the farside of the moon is the best place to detect technosignature and also introduce radio observatories on the farside of the moon that have been proposed in radio astronomy. The SETI (Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence) project on the farside of the moon is expected to be one of the main candidates for international collaboration research topics on lunar surface observatory.

• The Bulletin of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.45 no.1
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• pp.40.1-40.1
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• 2020

The Korea Astronomy and Space Science Institute is participating as a South Korean partner in the Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS)of NASA. In response, the Korea Astronomy and Space Science Institute is currently conducting basic research for the development of four candidate instrument payloads. The magnetic field instrument is one of them and it's scientific mission objective is the moon's surface magnetic field investigation. Therefore, the development requirement of the lunar surface magnetic field instrument were derived and the initial conceptual design was started. The magnetic field instrument has a 1.2 meter boom which has two three-axis fluxgate magnetometer sensors and one gyro sensor to get a attitude information of the boom. The concept of measuring the lunar surface magnetic field will carry out using multiple sensors by placing semiconductor type magnetic field sensors inside the electric box including boom mounted fluxgate sensors. In order to overcome the very short development period, we will use the KPLO (Korean Lunar Pathfinder Orbiter) magnetometer design and parts to improve reliabilities for this instrument. In this presentation, we introduce the instrument requirements and conceptual design for the Lunar surface magnetic field instruments.

• Journal of Astronomy and Space Sciences
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• v.34 no.4
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• pp.281-288
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• 2017

The first Korea lunar orbiter, Korea Pathfinder Lunar Orbiter (KPLO), has been in development since 2016. After launch, the KPLO will execute several maneuvers to enter into the lunar mission orbit, and will then perform lunar science missions for one year. Among these maneuvers, the lunar orbit insertion (LOI) is the most critical maneuver because the KPLO will experience an extreme velocity change in the presence of the Moon's gravitational pull. However, the lunar orbiter may have a delayed LOI burn during operation due to hardware limitations and telemetry delays. This delayed burn could occur in different captured lunar orbits; in the worst case, the KPLO could fly away from the Moon. Therefore, in this study, the burn delay for the first LOI maneuver is analyzed to successfully enter the desired lunar orbit. Numerical simulations are performed to evaluate the difference between the desired and delayed lunar orbits due to a burn delay in the LOI maneuver. Based on this analysis, critical factors in the LOI maneuver, the periselene altitude and orbit period, are significantly changed and an additional delta-V in the second LOI maneuver is required as the delay burn interval increases to 10 min from the planned maneuver epoch.

• Journal of Space Technology and Applications
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• v.1 no.2
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• pp.217-240
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• 2021

Upon the human exploration era of the Moon, this paper introduces lunar topography and geologic fundamentals to space scientists. The origin of scientific terminology for the lunar topography was briefly summarized, and the extension of the current Korean terminology is suggested. Specifically, we suggest the most representative lunar topography that are useful to laymen as 1 ocean (Oceanus Procellarum), 10 maria (Mare Imbrium, Mare Serenitatis, Mare Tranuillitatis, Mare Nectaris, Mare Fecundatis, Mare Crisium, Mare Vaporium, Mare Cognitum, Mare Humorum, Mare Nubium), 6 great craters (Tyco, Copernicus, Kepler, Aristachus, Stebinus, Langrenus). We also suggest Korean terms for highland, maria, mountains, crater, rille, rima, graben, dome, lava tube, wrinkle ridge, trench, rupes, and regolith. In addition, we introduce the standard model for the lunar interior and typical rocks. According to the standard model on the basis of historical impact events, the lunar geological eras are classified as Pre-Nectarian, Nectarian, Imbrian, Erathostenesian, and Copernican in chronologic order. Finally, we summarize the latest discovery records on the water on the Moon, and introduce the concept of water extraction from the lunar soil, which is to be developed by the Korea Institute of Geoscience and Mineral Resources (KIGAM).

• The Bulletin of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.38 no.2
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• pp.93.2-93.2
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• 2013

Polarization of the light scattered by the lunar surface contains information on the mean particle size of the lunar regolith, which gradually decreases by continued micro-meteoroid impact over a long period and thus is an age indicator of the surface. We performed multi-band (U, B, V, R and I) polarimetric observations toward the whole near side of the Moon at the Lick observatory using a 15-cm reflecting telescope with 1.1km/pixel spatial resolution at the center of the lunar disk. We analyze the color dependence of the polarization properties of the lunar regolith and discuss its implication for the study of lunar swirls.

• Journal of Astronomy and Space Sciences
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• v.37 no.1
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• pp.35-42
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• 2020

Particle-in-cell simulations were performed to understand the interaction of the solar wind with localized magnetic fields on the sunlit surface of the Moon. The results indicated a mini-magnetosphere was formed which had a thin magnetopause with the thickness of the electron skin depth. It was also found that the solar wind penetrated into the cavity of the magnetosphere intermittently rather than in a steady manner. The solar wind that moved around the magnetosphere was observed to hit the surface of the Moon, implying that it may be the cause of the lunar swirl formation on the surface.