The upcoming lunar lander missions, for example Chang’e 2 from CNSA and several mission proposals and studies currently under consideration at NASA (e.g. Neal et al., ROSES 2006 Proposal to NASA, 2006), ESA (e.g. Hufenbach, European Workshop on Lunar Landers, ESTEC, Noordwijk, The Netherlands, 2005; Foing, EPSC Abstracts, vol 2, EPSC2007-A-00422, European Planetary Science Congress, Potsdam, Ge...

This chapter discusses the physical properties of the lunar surface, determined at depths varying from a few micrometers to a few tens of meters. The properties considered include geotechnical properties (those properties of a planetary surface needed to evaluate engineering problems, including the mechanical properties of soil and rock), electrical and electromagnetic properties, and the refle...

China first lunar probe satellite “Chang’E-1(CE-1)” was successfully launched on Oct.24th, 2007 and reached the lunar polar working orbit with 200km altitude from lunar surface on Nov.7th . CE-1 satellite had been working normally during more than one year life time and has collected huge scientific data and images. Chang’E-1 microwave sounder (CELMS) is a four-frequency microwave radiometer. T...

The lunar geological record has much to tell us about the earliest history of the Solar System, the origin and evolution of the Earth-Moon system, the geological evolution of rocky planets, and the near-Earth cosmic environment throughout Solar System history. In addition, the lunar surface offers outstanding opportunities for research in astronomy, astrobiology, fundamental physics, life scien...

[1] Observations of heavy ions of lunar origin give important information regarding lunar exospheric processes, especially with respect to exospheric particle abundance and composition. Electrostatic analyzers without a time-of-flight section provide highly sensitive, absolute density detection but without mass discrimination. Here we place constraints on lunar ion species through inference of ...

Synchrony of spawning in many hermatypic corals, typically a few nights after the full moon, is putatively dependent on solar and lunar light cycles in conjunction with other possible cues such as tides and temperature. We analyze here the contributions of separate components of light dynamics, because the effects of twilight and lunar skylight on coral spawning synchrony have previously been c...

We report new high-precision laser fluorination three-isotope oxygen data for lunar materials. Terrestrial silicates with a range of δO values (−0.5 to 22.9‰) were analyzed to independently determine the slope of the terrestrial fractionation line (TFL; λ=0.5259±0.0008; 95% confidence level). This new TFL determination allows direct comparison of lunar oxygen isotope systematics with those of E...

The engineering properties of the lunar regolith reflect aspects of the original parent rock and the consequences of hypervelocity meteor bombardment. Compared to the Earth the geologic nature of the lunar regolith is quite distinct. On scales relevant to machinery, heterogeneity with respect to size and composition is much higher. But the total range in composition is much more restricted. Bot...