London
This week, the “Lunar Trailblazer” spacecraft will launch from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida, carrying an advanced camera designed by a team of scientists from the University of Oxford to measure the lunar surface temperature and identify potential water locations.
The spacecraft is scheduled to launch aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket next Thursday at the earliest, with a launch window extending over four days.
Scientists have suspected the presence of water on the lunar surface since Indian and American spacecraft detected signs of minerals containing water molecules in 2009.
Professor Neil Bowles, a scientist in the Department of Physics at the University of Oxford, stated that despite the spacecraft’s small size, weighing approximately 200 kilograms, it has a scientifically significant goal. He noted that we believe there is water at the lunar poles in the form of ice, and there may be very thin layers of water on the surface. He emphasized that the mission of the spacecraft is to attempt to map this water and understand its nature.
