OpenLuna Science
**OL Science Team meetings will commence in Feb 2009. Please contact Melissa (contact info at [1]) if you have relevant expertise & would like to participate in future meetings. Meeting notes will be posted here: OpenLuna Science.**
February 4, 2009
OpenLuna Science Team Meeting Notes
In attendance: Dom, Simon, Matt, Haley, Ed, Mel
Absent: Rhi, Em, Rod, Laura, Annie
Location: University of Western Ontario, Centre for Planetary Science & Exploration, http://planetsci.uwo.ca/
Meeting Agenda:
1. Overview of the tasks at hand (scouting class & sample return class missions, for now);
2. Top-level brainstorming of major science goals & requirements on the planned near-term lunar robotic missions;
3. Discuss specific points:
• Possible landing locations (regions, not specific sites) + rationale?
• What instrumentation do we need on each of the rovers?
• Science payload requirements for each of the landers?
• What sort of payload space/mass do we need to plan for on the landers & satellite?
• How small of a payload could be useful? Note that Science Payload = roughly 20 lbs per rover, for ~10 rovers (exact mass of payload will determine the number of rovers, therefore limiting or increasing # of potential landing sites)
Results of brainstorming:
• Camera on each rover (TBD)
• Reflector on top of each rover for lazer ranging
• Test life detection tools on “planted” organic matter
• Petri dish “mini-dome” or spores (seed a panel of the lander?)
• Plant growth experiments with regolith
• Micrometeorite flux measurement: aerogel on each rover
• Dosimeter: flux of one or more types of radiation
• Save one rover for PR: just a camera & arm
• LIDAR for dust settling (but ~100 lbs)
• Mini-mass spectrometer (Carleton engineering, working with CSA – toaster sized)
• Dost lofting at the terminator
• Microwave sintering experiment; before & after shots, “lunar fire pit”
• Reactivity of lunar dust: measuring oxidation state
• ChemMin – XRD, XRF
• APXS
• Trenches, stratigraphy, look for permafrost
• GPR, stratigraphy, look for permafrost
• Study carbon (meteorite implanted) in regolith
• Lunar volatiles
• Geophysics (seismics, part of International lunar network)
Landing sites: near south pole, permanently shadowed + sunlit areas, spanning to terminator “The D” – recently outgassing volcano
