NIGHT SURVIVAL AND LONG STAY FOR JAPANESE MOON LANDING

摘要

Following the LUNAR-A and SELENE, Japan has studied the moon lander with the reliable and safe landing capability by autonomous obstacle avoidance. The primary mission was set as the moon science around a central peak of a large crater to reveal the moon origin and evolution. For this concept, night survival capability is considered as optional, due to the required hard technology. However, night survival and long stay capability are essential for the genuine and full-scale moon development in the future. Even for the scientific exploration, a few months or a year mission period is requested from the scientists. For lunar base and moon utilization, a few years or unlimited system life period will be required. There are many proposals for this night survival capability, such as RTG utilization, location at the permanent sunshine zone, heat insulation tent by MLI, and so on. As the first step of the night survival capability study, the effect and damage of the moon night coldness is tested by thermal vacuum facility. Also some proposed concepts, including the wide utilization of moon regolith, are evaluated by thermal analysis for the moon base in the future.