Thermophysical properties of the regolith on the lunar far side revealed by the <i>in situ</i> temperature probing of the Chang’E-4 mission

Xiao, Xiao; Yu, Shuoran; Huang, Jun; Zhang, He; Zhang, Youwei; Xiao, Long

doi:10.1093/nsr/nwac175

Cited by 15 publications

(9 citation statements)

References 27 publications

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“…The CE-4 temperature data used in this study were obtained from February 27 to March 28, 2019 , which corresponding to a diurnal cycle at local time of the Moon, with a temperature variation range of 116.05-367.20 K. Taking into account the terrain's shading effect on sunlight [25], the lunar surface temperature in the CE-4 landing area was calculated. The computed sunrise and sunset times aligned with the measured temperature data, indicating that the measured data accurately reflects the temperature of the external surface of the installation site [28], [29]. The temperature data can be utilized to study the effect of the thermal environment on the surface temperature of the lander.…”

Section: B In-situ Measurement Of Physical Temperaturementioning

confidence: 65%

In Situ Measurements of Thermal Environment on the Moon's Surface Revealed by the Chang'E-4 And Chang'E-5 Missions

Liu,

Huang

2024

IEEE J. Sel. Top. Appl. Earth Observations Remote Sensing

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The thermal environment of the lunar surface is 1 of crucial importance for the lander thermal design and the 2 interpretation of scientific data. Clarifying the radiative sources 3 and intensity on the outer surface of the lander is one of 4 the key aspects of lander thermal design. The installation of 5 temperature sensors on the body of the Chang'e-4 (CE-4) and 6 Chang'e-5 (CE-5) landers has provided valuable opportunities 7 for quantifying the influence of lunar thermal conditions on the 8 surface temperature of the lander. In this study, we established 9 a temperature model for the near-surface regolith and a heat 10 transfer model based on the observations from sensors installed 11 on the body of the lander and auxiliary pillars. By integrating 12 factors such as the density of the lunar regolith, the thermal 13 conductivity of the lunar regolith, and the relative positions of 14 the temperature measurement points to the Earth and the Sun, 15 we conducted analyses on the temperature measurement data 16 for both CE-4 and CE-5, respectively. Our results indicate that 17 during the daytime of the Moon, the temperature of the lander's 18 surface is mainly influenced by solar radiation and the infrared 19 thermal radiation from the lunar surface. During the nighttime 20 of the Moon, the heat transferred outward from the inside of 21 the lander plays a key role in the temperature of the outer 22 surface of the lander. The lunar surface thermal environment 23 significantly affects the temperatures of both the shaded and 24 sunny sides of the lander, with its influence on the shaded side 25 even surpassing that on the sunny side. The lunar surface's 26 thermal environment directly impacts the stability and reliability 27 of the electronic components within scientific payloads. Our 28 results offer dependable lunar thermal environment parameters 29 for the design of scientific instruments on future lunar landers 30 and the deployment of instruments in their designated positions.

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Section: B In-situ Measurement Of Physical Temperaturementioning

confidence: 65%

In Situ Measurements of Thermal Environment on the Moon's Surface Revealed by the Chang'E-4 And Chang'E-5 Missions

Liu,

Huang

2024

IEEE J. Sel. Top. Appl. Earth Observations Remote Sensing

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“…Another study by Xiao et al. (2022) identifies the derived mean grain size as the number‐weighted grain size.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Sakatani et al (2018) model the thermal conductivity of a polydisperse granular packing as monodisperse grains identified as the volumetric median grain size. Another study by Xiao et al (2022) identifies the derived mean grain size as the number-weighted grain size.…”

Section: Derived Grain Radiusmentioning

confidence: 99%

A Microphysical Thermal Model for the Lunar Regolith: Investigating the Latitudinal Dependence of Regolith Properties

Bürger,

Hayne,

Gundlach

et al. 2024

JGR Planets

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The microphysical structure of the lunar regolith provides information on the geologic history of the Moon. We used remote sensing measurements of thermal emission and a thermophysical model to determine the microphysical properties of the lunar regolith. We expand upon previous investigations by developing a microphysical thermal model, which more directly simulates regolith properties, such as grain size and volume filling factor. The modeled temperatures are matched with surface temperatures measured by the Diviner Lunar Radiometer Experiment on board the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter. The maria and highlands are investigated separately and characterized in the model by a difference in albedo and grain density. We find similar regolith temperatures for both terrains, which can be well described by similar volume filling factor profiles and mean grain sizes obtained from returned Apollo samples. We also investigate a significantly lower thermal conductivity for highlands, which formally also gives a very good solution, but in a parameter range that is well outside the Apollo data. We then study the latitudinal dependence of regolith properties up to ±80° latitude. When assuming constant regolith properties, we find that a variation of the solar incidence‐dependent albedo can reduce the initially observed latitudinal gradient between model and Diviner measurements significantly. A better match between measurements and model can be achieved by a variation in intrinsic regolith properties with a decrease in bulk density with increasing latitude. We find that a variation in grain size alone cannot explain the Diviner measurements at higher latitudes.

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“…The average density of the lunar surface regolith is about 1300 kg m −3 . Recent works based on the lunar far side obtained values for the upper top level as low as about 500 kg m −3 (Xiao et al 2022). We allow…”

Section: Surface Density Distributionmentioning

confidence: 98%

ASTERIA—Asteroid Thermal Inertia Analyzer

Novaković,

Fenucci,

Marčeta

et al. 2024

Planet. Sci. J.

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Thermal inertia estimates are available for a limited number of a few hundred objects, and the results are practically solely based on thermophysical modeling (TPM). We present a novel thermal inertia estimation method, the Asteroid Thermal Inertia Analyzer (ASTERIA). The core of the ASTERIA model is the Monte Carlo approach, based on the Yarkovsky drift detection. We validate our model on asteroid Bennu plus 10 well-characterized near-Earth asteroids (NEAs) for which a good estimation of the thermal inertia from TPM exists. The tests show that ASTERIA provides reliable results consistent with the literature values. The new method is independent of TPM, allowing an independent verification of the results. As the Yarkovsky effect is more pronounced in small asteroids, the noteworthy advantage of ASTERIA compared to TPM is the ability to work with smaller asteroids, for which TPM typically lacks input data. We used ASTERIA to estimate the thermal inertia of 38 NEAs, with 31 of them being sub-kilometer-sized asteroids. Twenty-nine objects in our sample are characterized as potentially hazardous asteroids. On the limitation side, ASTERIA is somewhat less accurate than TPM. The applicability of our model is limited to NEAs, as the Yarkovsky effect is yet to be detected in main-belt asteroids. However, we can expect a significant increase in high-quality measurements of the input parameters relevant to ASTERIA with upcoming surveys. This will surely increase the reliability of the results generated by ASTERIA and widen the model’s applicability.

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Thermophysical properties of the regolith on the lunar far side revealed by the in situ temperature probing of the Chang’E-4 mission

Cited by 15 publications

References 27 publications

In Situ Measurements of Thermal Environment on the Moon's Surface Revealed by the Chang'E-4 And Chang'E-5 Missions

In Situ Measurements of Thermal Environment on the Moon's Surface Revealed by the Chang'E-4 And Chang'E-5 Missions

A Microphysical Thermal Model for the Lunar Regolith: Investigating the Latitudinal Dependence of Regolith Properties

ASTERIA—Asteroid Thermal Inertia Analyzer

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