Japan’s Smart lander for investigating moon (SLIM) spacecraft successfully entered lunar orbit on December 25, 2023, aiming for a moon landing on January 19, 2024.
If the mission succeeds, Japan will be placed as the only fifth country to soft-land a robotic craft on the natural satellite, only a few months ahead of India’s succession of the Chandrayaan-3 mission in August.
Initially, SLIM entered into an elliptical orbit around the moon over 3 minutes or so, its apogee (farthest point)in this orbit was around 4,000 km and perigee (closest point) being 600 km above the lunar surface.
SLIM is a spacecraft built by the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) on September 7,2023 launched just two weeks after India’s Chandrayaan-3 mission succeeded and Russia’s Luna 25 spacecraft failed. SLIM marks the second Japanese attempt this year to soft land on the moon. Unfortunately, the HAKUTO-R M1 Lander, built by a Japanese company ispace, crashed in late April as its engines shut down too soon.
The spacecraft weighed just 590 kg during the launch, which is one-seventh of Chandrayaan-3, as the latter weighed about 3900 kg at its launch. At first, JAXA planned to launch XRISM (a next gen X-ray space telescope) onboard an H-2A rocket. However, delays in XRISM pushed further SLIM’s launch from 2021 to 2023.
In a recent update from JAXA, the agency has ascertained “From now until January 2024, the apolune point will be lowered, and the orbit adjusted to a circular orbit at an altitude of approximately 600 km. The perilune will then lower and preparations for landing will begin.The descent towards the moon will begin at around 0.00 pm(IST) on January 20. Landing on the lunar surface is scheduled for around 0.20pm (JST) on January 20.”
Though, experts are heightened in curiosity, about the intriguing journey of SLIM and how it made its way to the moon. Comparatively, SLIM’s journey utilized a fuel-thrifty route based on weak-stability boundary theory, taking four months whereas Chandrayaan-3 took a shorter Hohmann transfer orbit which took less than three months.
Scientists are captivated by the moon’s south pole region, as these parts contain water-ice, and a lunar surface mission could potentially explore these sites and attempt to extract water.
JAXA’s SLIM mission stands as a pivotal testing ground for cutting-edge technologies, notably featuring matching algorithms and advanced navigation systems. SLIM’s success or failure will serve as a critical precursor shaping Japan’s collaboration with India on the LUPEX mission, which is intended to explore the moon’s south pole region requiring precise landing technologies.
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