Chandrayaan-4 mission will target this important objective on the Moon
Photo Credit: JAXA
Chandrayaan-4 mission is in the development stage and ISRO and JAXA have big plans for the lunar project. Check out the lunar water objective of ISRO.
Photo Credit: ISRO
ISRO and JAXA have collaborated to conduct a lunar project called LUPEX or Chandrayaan-4 mission. The lunar mission aims to conduct studies on the Moon’s south pole.
Photo Credit: ISRO
The integral objective of the mission is to find water on the lunar south pole. And to study its quality and quantity which can be a big breakthrough if discovered.
Photo Credit: ISRO
JAXA reports that the Moon has various 'permanently shadowed regions' (PSRs) where the direct sun rays can not reach. These areas can be the interior of a crater and the chances of finding water there increase.
Photo Credit: JAXA
As per scientists, these PSRs may contain water that has not evaporated simply because of the lack of sunlight. The sublimate water reportedly remains close to the lunar surface.
Photo Credit: JAXA
However, experts also suggest that there is no certainty of water quantity and distribution and whether the Chandrayaan-4 mission will be able to find it.
Photo Credit: Pixabay
Notably, the Chandrayaan-4 mission will likely be largely based on finding and studying lunar water.
Photo Credit: Pixabay
For the Chandrayaan-4 mission, ISRO will be developing the lander and JAXA will be developing the rover. Both the lander and the rover are expected to weigh about 350 kilograms.
Photo Credit: JAXA
Furthermore, the lunar mission will include various scientific instruments including NASA’s Neuron Spectrometer(NS) and ESA’s Exospheric Mass Spectrometer for LUPEX(EMS-L).
Photo Credit: Pixabay
The Chandrayaan-4 mission is expected to be launched in 2025 and the mission timeline would be over 3 months. This is massively larger than what was allotted to Chandrayaan-3.
Photo Credit: JAXA
Therefore, the Chandrayaan-4 mission will be more advanced than the Chandrayaan-3 mission in terms of surviving lunar night and conducting in-depth studies.