Three mannequins will set off on a journey beyond the Moon and back when NASA's most powerful rocket attempts its first flight this month. As part of NASA's Artemis program, the SLS rocket is supposed to carry astronauts to the Moon as early as 2025. There will be other voyagers along for the ride when the SLS lifts off on 29 August, including 10 small satellites to probe the Moon, asteroids, and the radiation environment of deep space.
Half of the satellites may not have enough power to start. They've been stuck within the rocket for more than a year because of launch delays, and their batteries have drained to a point where they're not able to unfurl their solar panels. Ben Malphrus of Morehead State University is the principal investigator for the lunar ice cube which has power concerns.
A test of CubeSats as deep space probes is at stake. Malphrus says that they are in the transition phase from being a curiosity to being a platform for real science. It's easy to assemble a cubeSat out of standard parts, which are supplied by a growing commercial base. Researchers can focus on developing instruments that can gather novel data if they can shrink them into a cubeSat package.
CubeSats are cheap due to the small size. At millions of dollars a pop compared with hundreds of millions for a bigger, stand-alone satellite on its own rocket, they are able to take on riskier missions. NASA's associate administrator for technology, policy, and strategy said failure is an option when it comes to cubesats.
Since NASA found a signal suggestive of water in the late 1990s, researchers have been interested in lunar ice. The regions it peered into were permanently shadowed. Extra hydrogen in the topmost meter of soil is believed to be the reason for the suppression of neutrons.
Many of the hydrogen is believed to be from ancient impacts of comets or asteroids that trapped water ice in the deepest part of the moon. The hydrogen could be put in by the wind. When hydrogen ion in the wind strikes oxygen-bearing minerals in lunar soil, it creates hydroxyl, which can be used to make water. If the Moon has enough water, it could be used for agriculture and life support. Hannah is a planetary scientist at the University of Central Florida.
The SLS CubeSat led by Craig Hardgrove of Arizona State University is going to attempt to improve on the maps of the South Pole. The team hopes to map excess hydrogen with a resolution of 20 to 30 kilometers, which is twice as good as the one found in the moon. It's possible to distinguish one deep crater from another. He says that craters lacking hydrogen, or enrichments outside the frigid hideouts, could be a sign of a recent impact that blasted out ice and redistributed it.
The ice cube will have a spectrometer that can detect the fingerprints of water or hydroxyl. The device is most sensitive to signs of water and hydroxyl in the lower latitudes. The effect of the solar wind on day by day is what the scientists are looking at.
10 small satellites will be carried by NASA's giant moon rocket when it is launched. Half of the satellites weren't allowed to charge their batteries, which could cause power issues on the first day.
| NAME | PURPOSE | LEAD DEVELOPER | BATTERY ISSUES |
|---|---|---|---|
| ArgoMoon | Monitor release of Cubesats, rocket stage | Italy’s space agency | |
| BioSentinel | Study radiation effects on yeast | NASA (Ames Research Center) | |
| CuSP | Study solar wind and magnetic fields | Southwest Research Institute | X |
| EQUULEUS | Image Earth’s plasmasphere | Japan’s space agency | |
| LunaH Map | Study lunar ice | Arizona State University | X |
| Lunar IceCube | Study lunar ice | Morehead State University | X |
| LunIR | Test novel infrared spectrometer | Lockheed Martin | X |
| NEA Scout | Fly to asteroid with a solar sail | NASA (Marshall Space Flight Center) | |
| OMOTENASHI | Put tiny lander on the lunar surface | Japan’s space agency | |
| Team Miles | Test plasma thrusters | Miles Space citizen scientists | X |
The CubeSats are going beyond the moon. The Near-Earth Asteroid Scout will release a thin solar sail after the SLS leaves Earth. The asteroid is between 5 and 15 meters in diameter. It's going to fly by the asteroid in 3 hours. According to Julie Castillo- Rogez, the principal investigator at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, NEA Scout will test the expectation that the faint pressure of sunlight has spun up 2020 GE too fast for it to hold any rubble.
The first test of the biological effects of radiation since the last Apollo mission in 1972 will be carried out by BioSentinel, a project led by a Biologist at NASA. A real concern for astronauts traveling to the Moon or Mars is the fact that organisms are more vulnerable to damage caused by solar flares and Cosmic rays. From a perch beyond the Moon, optical sensors on BioSentinel will measure the health of the yeast strains as they accumulate radiation damage.
During their long wait aboard the SLS, bioSentinel, Scout NEA, and three other CubeSats were allowed to replenish their batteries. LunaH Map and lunar ice cube were out of luck. NASA engineers worried that the process could cause discharges that could harm the rest of the rocket, so they removed them from the rocket. Jacob Bleacher, NASA's chief exploration scientist, says that they have to be aware of the risk when they interface with the CubeSats.
The threat to the mission is high because at 40% the CubeSat won't be able to run through a set of initial operations and maneuvers before the solar panels can unfurl. He says he tried to get the opportunity to regroup, but was turned down. He says that you can't take people and then kill them. He is resigned to rolling the dice even though he knows that the CubeSats are secondary. If you were not anxious, it wouldn't be a CubeSat mission.
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