by Space scientists are keen to defend the option of doing astronomy from the moon.
Plans are in the works to place astronomical hardware on the lunar landscape, such as a supercooled infrared telescope, an array of gravity detectors, large radio telescopes like Arecibo, even peek-a-boo instruments tuned to look for evidence. “out there” aliens.
Yes, the future of lunar astronomy is emerging. But some scientists say there is a critical need to protect any astronomical equipment based on the moon from interference from other planned activities on the moon, ensuring they can carry out their mission of exploring the world around them.
To that end, efforts are underway to scope and create a policy in collaboration with the United Nations in the hope of building international support for such protections.
Related: Gravitational wave detectors on the moon may be more sensitive than those on Earth
Global agreements
This action plan is being spearheaded by the International Astronomical Union (IAU). The IAU brings together over 12,000 active professional astronomers from more than 100 countries around the world.
Richard Green is the chairman of the IAU group that deals specifically with issues related to staging astronomy from the moon. He is also assistant director for government relations at the Steward Observatory, run by the University of Arizona in Tucson.
The IAU working group aims to collaborate with several other non-governmental organizations to protect the option of doing astronomy from the moon, Green tells Space.com.
Some participants in the IAU working group are spectrum managers from radio observatories, which are strongly linked to the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) and the ITU World Radiocommunication Conference, a treaty-level forum for review and revision, if necessary, on radio regulations and global agreements. regarding the use of the radio-frequency spectrum and the geostationary-satellite and non-geostationary-satellite orbits.
Members of the working group want to maximize the range of protected frequencies, “including the very low frequencies needed to study the early universe and auroral emissions from the planets,” says Green.
Fair access
The other approach, Green says, is to protect sites on the moon that might be suitable for cooled infrared telescopes or gravitational wave detector arrays.
“We have common cause with those who want to protect historic heritage sites and even those who want dedicated sites for water or mineral extraction,” says Green. “We imagine that the United Nations Committee on the Peaceful Uses of Outer Space is the center where some process can be developed to claim a site for defense and to resolve competing claims.”
The IAU Astronomy from the Moon working group has space law and policy experts who can provide a solid basis for that approach, Green says.
“Obviously, the main goal is astronomical observations that can be made individually from the moon,” Green explains. The working group is taking on the expertise of principal investigators on lunar missions or mission concepts.
Doing so, says Green, can help engage the astronomical community in prioritizing sites of genuine scientific interest and addressing issues related to the conduct of science in an environment of “equitable access”. spirit of the 1967 United Nations Space Treaty.
Obviously needed
Ian Crawford, professor of planetary science and astrobiology at Birkbeck College, London, is in favor of the IAU initiative.
“My view is that a subset of lunar sites, such as specific polar craters and key distant sites, need to be designated as ‘Sites of Special Scientific Importance’ and protected as such,” Crawford told Space.com. .
A possible model, according to Crawford, could be the Antarctic Special Protection Areas (ASPAs) as defined in Annex V of the Environmental Protocol to the Antarctic Treaty.
“In any case, there is a clear need for international coordination so the involvement of the United Nations seems entirely appropriate,” says Crawford.
Private partnerships
NASA is working with several US firms to deliver science and technology to the lunar surface through the Lunar Payload Services (CLPS) initiative.
Given the uptick in future CLPS-capable robotic lunar exploration, we are about to see the first NASA-funded science payloads land there in more than 51 years—since the Apollo 17 manned moon landing in December 1972, says Jack Burns, professor emeritus i. department of astrophysical and planetary sciences at the University of Colorado, Boulder.
One payload, for which Burns is serving as co-investigator, is called Radio Wave Observations of the Lunar Surface of the photoElectron Sheath (ROLSES). If successful, it would be the first radio telescope on the moon and would be located at the south pole of the moon. ROLSES is due to be launched there in February by Intuitive Machines’ Nova-C lunar lander IM-1 mission under the CLPS partnership.
It will be followed in two years by the Lunar Surface Electromagnetic Night Experiment, or LuSEE-Night, to be flown in 2026 aboard the Firefly Aerospace Blue Ghost Mission-2 lander. This effort is also part of the CLPS enterprise and Burns is a member of the science team of the LUNAR farside experiment.
LuSee-Night is a radio telescope that will probe the dark ages of the universe that have never been seen before — a time before the birth of the first stars.
Scientific fact
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With this emerging potential and promise of radio astronomy from the moon, Burns says “it is imperative that we develop international agreements now to protect the far side of the moon for radio astronomy because it is the only truly radio silence in the inner sun. system.”
Burns emphasizes that radio observations from the moon are no longer science fiction but science fact.
“We are entering a new era of scientific investigations from our nearest neighbor in space,” says Burns.
