Prime Minister announces india’s mission to moon

The Prime Minister, Mr Atal Bihari Vajpayee, announced in his Independence day address on August 15, 2003, that India will undertake an unmanned mission to Moon, “Chandrayaan-1”. The mission is aimed at expanding the scientific knowledge about the moon, upgrading India’s technological capability and providing challenging opportunities in planetary research for the younger generation.

Scientists discussing details of Chandrayaan-1

The scientific objective of Chandrayaan-1 will be the high resolution remote sensing of the Moon in the visible, near Infrared, low energy X-ray and high-energy X-ray regions for preparing a 3-dimensional atlas of regions of scientific interest with a high spatial and altitude resolution of 5-10 m; Chemical mapping of the entire lunar surface for elements such as Magnesium, Aluminium, Silicon, Calcium, Iron and Titanium with a spatial resolution of 10 km and elements of high atomic numbers (Z), such as 222Radon, Uranium, Thorium and Gadolinium with a spatial resolution of 20 km.

The spacecraft will carry the following scientific instruments:
• Terrain Mapping Camera (TMC) with stereo imaging capability operating in panchromatic band, with 5 m spatial resolution and 40 km swath
• A Hyper-Spectral Imager (HySI) operating in 400-900 nanometer(nm) band with a spectral resolution of 15 nm, a spatial resolution of 80 m and a swath of 40 km
• A Lunar Laser Ranging instrument (LLRI) with a height resolution of 10 m
• A Low Energy (1-10 keV) X-ray spectrometer (LEX) for measuring fluorescent X-rays emanating from lunar surface with a footprint of 10 km
• A High Energy X-ray (10-200 keV) mapping camera (HEX) with a footprint of 20 km to identify degassing faults or zones on the moon by mapping 222Radon, and its radioactive daughter 210Lead