China launches Chang’e-6 lunar probe to collect far side Moon samples in world first (2024)

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China launches Chang’e-6 lunar probe to collect far side Moon samples in world first? ›

China's Chang'e-6 spacecraft launched on May 3, 2024 on a mission to collect samples from the far side of the Moon. The mission aims to grab samples containing material ejected from the lunar mantle and thus provide insight into the history of the Moon, Earth, and Solar System.

Chang'e 6 is aiming for Apollo crater, inside the moon's South Pole-Aitken (SPA) basin, where researchers believe samples may contain clues about the moon's early history and evolution.

Besides CubeSats from Pakistan, the Chang'e-6 mission also carries a number of other international payloads to the moon, including the European Space Agency's lunar surface ion analyzer, France's radon detection instrument, and Italy's laser corner reflector.

China's Chang'e-6 mission is intended to bring back lunar samples but is also a stepping stone to much more ambitious space exploration. China launched one of its most ambitious missions so far on 3 May, sending a stack of four spacecraft towards the Moon.

The study published on Saturday in the peer-reviewed journal Science Advances revealed that the lunar soil at the landing site contains less than 120 parts-per-million (ppm) water or 120 grams water per ton, and a light, vesicular rock carries 180 ppm, which are much drier than that on Earth.

Geologic samples returned from the Moon by the Apollo lunar surface exploration missions (1969-1972), along with associated data records, are physically protected, environmentally preserved, and scientifically processed in a special building dedicated for that purpose at the Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas.

The first rover to visit the far side of the moon, China's Yutu-2, has found stark differences between there and the near side. These include stickier, more supportive soil on the far side and a greater abundance of small rocks and impact craters.

The United States and China explore lunar presence of critical minerals. As China, the U.S. and other countries work to expand mining and production of rare earth elements, the race to mine in space is growing more competitive.

As outlined in the Outer Space Treaty of 1967, international space law explicitly states that celestial bodies, including the Moon, cannot be subject to national appropriation or sovereignty claims. This legal framework clarifies that no country, including China, can lay exclusive ownership claims to the Moon.

What is Chang E flying to the Moon? ›

In older versions of the story, Chang'e stole the elixir from Hou Yi, drank it, and flew to the Moon so that her husband could not go after her. In the most classic version of the story, Wu Gang does good deeds for the King, and receives an immortality pill from him, and is asked to keep it safe in his house.

Classic painting features Lady Chang'e and her pet, the Jade Rabbit, in the Palace of the Moon.

Six missions landed humans on the Moon, beginning with Apollo 11 in July 1969, during which Neil Armstrong became the first person to walk on the Moon. Apollo 13 was intended to land; however, it was restricted to a flyby due to a malfunction aboard the spacecraft. All ten crewed missions returned safely to the Earth.

Changesite-(Y), which falls in the category of lunar merrillite, has become the first lunar mineral discovered and identified by Chinese scientists, making China the third nation in the world, after the United States and Russia, to have achieved such a feat, officials from the two agencies said at a news conference in ...

(AP) — Scientists have discovered a new and renewable source of water on the moon for future explorers in lunar samples from a Chinese mission. Water was embedded in tiny glass beads in the lunar dirt where meteorite impacts occur.

China is aiming to become the first nation to ever retrieve samples from the far-side of the moon with an ambitious mission to send a probe to the unexplored region that launched Friday.

The target landing area is within the vast, ancient South Pole-Aitken Basin (SPA) and is thought to contain material excavated from the moon's mantle.

Mission Objective

Apollo 13 was supposed to land in the Fra Mauro area. An explosion on board forced Apollo 13 to circle the moon without landing. The Fra Mauro site was reassigned to Apollo 14.

The ILRS will serve as a comprehensive scientific experiment base built on the lunar surface or in lunar orbit that can carry out multi-disciplinary and multi-objective scientific research activities including exploration and utilization, lunar-based observation, basic scientific experiment and technical verification, ...

Between 1969 and 1972 six Apollo missions brought back 382 kilograms (842 pounds) of lunar rocks, core samples, pebbles, sand and dust from the lunar surface. The six space flights returned 2200 separate samples from six different exploration sites on the Moon.