नवीनतम
ISRO to launch its Chandrayaan-3 mission likely in July 2023
BENGALURU [Maha Media]: If things go as planned, the Indian Space Research Organisation would launch its ambitious Chandrayaan-3 mission aimed at demonstrating critical technologies to land the spacecraft on the south pole of the moon in less than two months.
Chandrayaan-3 mission carries scientific instruments to study the thermo-physical properties of the lunar regolith, lunar seismicity, lunar surface plasma environment and elemental composition in the vicinity of the landing site.
"Chandrayaan-3 mission is scheduled in July second week," a senior official of the Bengaluru-headquartered national space agency under the Department of Space told PTI on Thursday.
While the scope of these scientific instruments on the lander and the rover would fit in the theme of 'Science of the Moon', another experimental instrument would study the spectro-polarimetric signatures of the Earth from the lunar orbit, which would fit in the theme of 'Science from the Moon', according to ISRO officials.
In March this year, Chandrayaan-3 spacecraft successfully completed the essential tests that validated its capability to withstand the harsh vibration and acoustic environment that the spacecraft would face during its launch.
These tests were particularly challenging, considering the fact that the Chandrayaan-3 spacecraft, which would be launched by LVM3 (Launch Vehicle Mark-III) (earlier referred as GSLV Mk III) from SDSC SHAR, Sriharikota, is a composite of three modules -- propulsion, lander and rover.
"Chandrayaan-3 is a follow-on mission to Chandrayaan-2 to demonstrate end-to-end capability in safe landing and roving on the lunar surface. It consists of Lander and Rover configuration", an ISRO official said.
The propulsion module, which has Spectro-polarimetry of Habitable Planet Earth (SHAPE) payload to study the spectral and Polari metric measurements of Earth from the lunar orbit, would carry the lander and rover configuration till 100 km lunar orbit.
