[FPSPACE] Fw: EPSC: Updated SMART-1 Image of New Target for LCROSS Impact

Wed Oct 7 09:53:21 EDT 2009

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-----Original Message-----
From: "AAS Press Officer Dr. Rick Fienberg" <rick.fienberg at aas.org>
Date: Wed, 7 Oct 2009 13:36:41 
To: <Rick.Fienberg at aas.org>
Subject: EPSC: Updated SMART-1 Image of New Target for LCROSS Impact

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 (FORWARDING DOES NOT IMPLY ENDORSEMENT BY THE AMERICAN ASTRONOMICAL
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 7 October 2009

 Media Contact:
 Anita Heward
 Europlanet Press Officer
 +44 (0)7756-034243
 media.centre at europlanet-eu.org

 ** Additional contacts appear below. **

 UPDATED SMART-1 IMAGE OF NEW TARGET FOR LCROSS IMPACT

 The European Space Agency's SMART-1 team has released an updated image
 of the future impact site of NASA's Lunar Crater Observation and
 Sensing Satellite (LCROSS), after the LCROSS team announced a new
 target last week. LCROSS will search for water ice on the Moon by
 making two impacts into a crater named Cabeus at the lunar South Pole.
 The impacts are scheduled for 11:31:19 UTC and 11:35:45 UTC on 9
 October 2009.

 Bjoern Grieger, the liaison scientist for SMART-1's AMIE camera, and
 Bernard Foing, ESA SMART-1 Project Scientist, have searched through
 SMART-1's database for images of Cabeus, taken four years ago. The
 SMART-1 images are at high resolution as the spacecraft was near its
 closest distance of 500 km from the South Pole. The SMART-1 images of
 LCROSS potential targets were discussed on 18 September at lunar
 sessions of European Planetary Science Congress (EPSC) in Potsdam,
 Germany.

 The Cabeus crater interior is permanently shadowed, so ice lying
 inside the crater could be protected from the Sun's harsh rays. LCROSS
 will send the upper stage Centaur rocket crashing into Cabeus and a
 shepherd spacecraft will fly into the plume of dust generated and
 measure its properties before making a second impact with the lunar
 surface. Astronomers will observe both impacts using ground and
 space-based telescopes. The SMART-1 spacecraft also concluded its
 mission with a controlled bouncing impact on 3 September 2006. The
 event was observed with ground-based telescopes (a "dry run" for
 LCROSS), and the flash from the impact was detected at infrared
 wavelengths.

  "The Cabeus topographic features as observed by SMART-1 vary greatly
 during the lunar rotation and the yearly seasons due to the polar
 grazing illumination conditions", said Foing. "The floor of Cabeus
 near LCROSS targets shows a number of small craters and seems old
 enough to have accumulated water ice delivered from comets and
 water-rich asteroids, and might have kept it frozen in its shadowed
 area."

 "These ESA SMART-1 observations of the Cabeus crater can help in the
 final planning and interpretation of LCROSS impact observations", he
 added.

 IMAGE

 http://www.europlanet-eu.org/demo/images/stories/ep/news/epsc2009/cabeus.jpg <http://www.europlanet-eu.org/demo/images/stories/ep/news/epsc2009/cabeus.jpg> 

 Image caption:
 New LCROSS impact target Cabeus: Mosaic of 4 images taken by the
 Advanced Moon Imaging Experiment (AMIE) on board ESA's SMART-1
 mission. The SMART-1 images forming the mosaic have been taken at
 different epochs with different illumination conditions: in January
 2005 from a distance of 1037 km and on February 2006 from a distance
 of 622 km. The SMART-1 AMIE mosaic size is 100 km. The dots at the
 center of the image indicate the impact points for the LCROSS Centaur
 stage and shepherd spacecraft well placed within the shadowed area.

 Image credit:
 B.Grieger, B.H. Foing & ESA/SMART-1/ AMIE team

 FURTHER INFORMATION

 * SMART-1 public website: http://www.esa.int/smart-1/ <http://www.esa.int/smart-1/> 
 * SMART-1 Scitech website: http://sci.es.aint/smart-1/ <http://sci.es.aint/smart-1/> 
 * LCROSS website:
 http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/LCROSS/main/index.html <http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/LCROSS/main/index.html> 
 * Lunar south polar maps from SMART-1:
 http://www.esa.int/SPECIALS/SMART-1/SEM1S6M5NDF_0.html <http://www.esa.int/SPECIALS/SMART-1/SEM1S6M5NDF_0.html> 
 * SMART-1 impact:
 http://www.esa.int/SPECIALS/SMART-1/SEMWX03VRRE_0.html <http://www.esa.int/SPECIALS/SMART-1/SEMWX03VRRE_0.html> 
 * International Lunar Exploration Working Group (ILEWG):
 http://sci.esa.int/ilewg <http://sci.esa.int/ilewg> 

 Science Contacts:
 Bernard H. Foing
 ESA SMART-1 Project Scientist
 Executive Director, ILEWG
 bernard.foing at esa.int

 Bjoern Grieger
 SMART-1 AMIE Liaison Scientist
 bjoern.grieger at esa.int

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