Author Topic: Future ISRO lunar missions  (Read 1247 times)

Offline sanman

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Future ISRO lunar missions
« on: 10/19/2016 06:43 am »
I wanted to ask about this - what's the advantage/rationale of putting a telescope on the surface of the Moon, as opposed to just putting one in space? I get that the Moon has no atmosphere for optical distortion, but space doesn't either. It just seems to me that you're doing the extra work of traversing the lunar gravity well, with the effect of shrinking your payload to do so - so what benefit do you get?

Offline cave_dweller

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Re: Future ISRO lunar missions
« Reply #1 on: 10/19/2016 09:09 pm »
I wanted to ask about this - what's the advantage/rationale of putting a telescope on the surface of the Moon, as opposed to just putting one in space? I get that the Moon has no atmosphere for optical distortion, but space doesn't either. It just seems to me that you're doing the extra work of traversing the lunar gravity well, with the effect of shrinking your payload to do so - so what benefit do you get?

Longevity.

Man made satellites have limited time spans (for now) due to fuel containment limits. The lifetime of an otherwise perfectly good telescope is limited by this reality.

Having an installation on moon would mean taking advantage of natural circumstances. But then again, if the telescope ever needs a service/overhaul or upgrade, it would be a fairly expensive intervention.


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