Electrostatic dust remediation for future exploration of the Moon

Hirabayashi, Masatoshi; Hartzell, C. M.; Bellan, Paul M.; Bodewits, Dennis; Delzanno, Gian Luca; Hyde, Truell; Konopka, Uwe; Thomas, E.; Thomas, Hubertus M.; Hahn, Inseob; Israelsson, Ulf

doi:10.1016/j.actaastro.2023.03.005

Cited by 7 publications

(4 citation statements)

References 45 publications

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“…Artemis will send the first human missions to the lunar south pole, and if water-ice interactions do indeed generate a higher concentration of fine particulate material on the lunar surface as they did for our samples, astronauts may face greater difficulties when working in the lunar regolith environment than they did during the Apollo era. Much research is currently being conducted regarding in situ resource utilization (e.g., Purrington et al 2022;Olthoff et al 2023;Slumba 2023), dust mitigation and interactions (e.g., Cao et al 2023;Hirabayashi et al 2023;Wells et al 2023), rover and tool development (e.g., Budzyn et al 2023;Long-Fox et al 2023), and astronaut health and safety (e.g., Pohlen et al 2022). However, our understanding of the particle size distribution of the lunar regolith and the processes acting to mechanically break down the regolith in the lunar polar regions and the PSRs, which greatly affects all aforementioned areas of research, is limited.…”

Section: Implications For Future Lunar Surface Sciencementioning

confidence: 99%

Morphological and Spectral Characterization of Lunar Regolith Breakdown due to Water Ice

Shackelford,

Donaldson Hanna,

Horton

et al. 2024

Planet. Sci. J.

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Remote sensing observations of the Moon suggest that the lunar polar regolith environment is affected by several natural processes that may cause the regolith in these regions to become more porous and fine particulate. One of these processes may be the mechanical breakdown of regolith particles through the interaction of water ice and regolith by frost wedging. We present morphological and spectral analyses of high-fidelity lunar regolith simulants LHS-1 (lunar highlands simulant-1) and LMS-1 (lunar mare simulant-1) that have been exposed to varying concentrations of water ice (1, 10, and 30 wt%) over extended periods of time (1, 3, and 6 months) to evaluate the extent at which lunar regolith may be weathered by ice-regolith interactions in the Moon’s polar regions. To characterize changes in regolith particle morphology, we explored grain size and shape parameters with the CILAS ExpertShape suite and characterized the abundance and evolution of clinging fines with scanning electron microscopy and energy dispersive X-ray spectroscopy. Reflectance spectra were taken from 1.0–22.5 μm (444.4–10,000 cm−1) to characterize any differences in spectral features that may occur as a result of regolith breakdown. Both the morphological and spectral investigations display trends that show simulant particle degradation as a function of composition, increasing water concentration, and freezing time. Our study demonstrates that the lunar regolith is susceptible to mechanical breakdown in the presence of water ice and that water ice is likely a contributor to the weathering environment within permanently shadowed regions on the lunar surface.

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Section: Implications For Future Lunar Surface Sciencementioning

confidence: 99%

Morphological and Spectral Characterization of Lunar Regolith Breakdown due to Water Ice

Shackelford,

Donaldson Hanna,

Horton

et al. 2024

Planet. Sci. J.

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“…It is therefore important to take countermeasures to eliminate its effects on instrumentation. For example, electromagnetic removal has been proposed [17]. In fact, the 15 cm telescope operations of the Chang'E 3 mission have shown that the dust problem may not be too severe [18].…”

Section: Issues (A) Dustmentioning

confidence: 99%

Astronomy from the moon in the next decades: from exoplanets to cosmology in visible light and beyond

Schneider,

Kervella,

Labeyrie

2024

Phil. Trans. R. Soc. A.

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We look at what astronomy from the Moon might be like over the next few decades. The Moon offers the possibility of installing large telescopes or interferometers with instruments larger than those on orbiting telescopes. We first present examples of ambitious science cases, in particular ideas that cannot be implemented from Earth. After a general review of observational approaches, from photometry to high contrast and high angular resolution imaging, we propose as a first step a 1-metre-class precursor and explore what science can be done with it. We add a proposal to use the Earth–Moon system to test the quantum physics theory. This article is part of a discussion meeting issue 'Astronomy from the Moon: the next decades (part 2)'.

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“…Active removal of dust should be possible electrostatically, by lofting charged dust particles away from surfaces using suitable electrically biased plates or wands. Dust particles could also be actively charged using electron beams or plasma jets, thereby allowing them to be lofted and removed [ 36 ]. Such devices may either be fitted on the telescopes, or they could be outsourced to service modules and robots in the longer term.…”

Section: Site Considerationsmentioning

confidence: 99%

X-ray astronomy from the lunar surface

Gandhi

2024

Phil. Trans. R. Soc. A.

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Motivated by efforts to return humanity to the Moon, three cases are reviewed for X-ray astronomy from the lunar surface: (i) facilitation of ambitious engineering designs including high-throughput telescopes, long focal length optics and X-ray interferometery; (ii) occultation studies and the gain they enable in astrometric precision; and (iii) multi-messenger time-domain coordinated observations. The potential benefits of, and challenges presented by, operating from the Moon are discussed. Some of these cases have relatively low mass budgets and could be conducted as early pathfinders, while others are more ambitious and will likely need to await improvements in technology or well-developed lunar bases. This article is part of a discussion meeting issue ‘Astronomy from the Moon: the next decades (part 2)’.

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Electrostatic dust remediation for future exploration of the Moon

Cited by 7 publications

References 45 publications

Morphological and Spectral Characterization of Lunar Regolith Breakdown due to Water Ice

Morphological and Spectral Characterization of Lunar Regolith Breakdown due to Water Ice

Astronomy from the moon in the next decades: from exoplanets to cosmology in visible light and beyond

X-ray astronomy from the lunar surface

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