GRAIL Lunar mission

[Rick]

NASA's GRAIL Moon Twins are Joined to Their Booster

NASA's lunar-bound GRAIL twins were mated to their Delta II launch vehicle at the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station's Launch Complex 17 at 8:45 a.m. EDT (5:45 a.m. PDT) today. The 15-mile (25-kilometer) trip from Astrotech Space Operations in Titusville, Fla., is the last move for GRAIL before it begins its journey to the moon. NASA's dynamic duo will orbit the moon to determine the structure of the lunar interior from crust to core and to advance understanding of the thermal evolution of the moon.

More: http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.cfm?release=2011-257

Mission pages: http://www.nasa.gov/grail

(Apparently GRAIL is an acronym for "Gravity Recovery And Interior Laboratory". Who makes these up? -- Rick)

[Rick]

NASA Launches Mission to Study Moon From Crust to Core

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. -- NASA's twin lunar Gravity Recovery and Interior Laboratory (GRAIL) spacecraft lifted off from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida at 9:08 a.m. EDT (6:08 a.m. PDT) Saturday, Sept. 10, to study the moon in unprecedented detail.

GRAIL-A is scheduled to reach the moon on New Year's Eve 2011, while GRAIL-B will arrive New Year's Day 2012. The two solar-powered spacecraft will fly in tandem orbits around the moon to measure its gravity field. GRAIL will answer longstanding questions about the moon and give scientists a better understanding of how Earth and other rocky planets in the solar system formed.

More: http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/grail/news/grail20110910r.html

[Whitters]

NASA Science News for Dec. 13, 2012
A pair of NASA spacecraft orbiting the Moon are being prepared for a controlled descent into a mountain near the lunar north pole on Monday, Dec. 17.

FULL STORY: http://science.nasa.gov/science-news/science-at-nasa/2012/13dec_grail/

[Rick]

Rocket Burn Sets Stage for Dynamic Moon Duos' Lunar Impact

The lunar twins of NASA's Gravity Recovery and Interior Laboratory (GRAIL) mission have each completed a rocket burn that has sealed their fate. The burns modified the orbit of the formation-flying spacecraft. Over the next three days, this new orbit will carry the twins lower and lower over the moon's surface. On Monday afternoon, Dec. 17, at about 2:28 p.m. PST (5:28 p.m. EST), their moon-skimming will conclude when a portion of the lunar surface - an unnamed mountain near the natural satellite's north pole - rises higher than their orbital altitude.

More: http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.php?release=2012-399

[Rick]

NASA's GRAIL Lunar Impact Site Named for Astronaut Sally Ride

NASA has named the site where twin agency spacecraft impacted the moon Monday in honor of the late astronaut Sally K. Ride, who was America's first woman in space and a member of the probes' mission team.

Last Friday, Ebb and Flow, the two spacecraft comprising NASA's Gravity Recovery and Interior Laboratory (GRAIL) mission, were commanded to descend into a lower orbit that would result in an impact Monday on a mountain near the moon's north pole. The formation-flying duo hit the lunar surface as planned at 2:28:51 p.m. PST (5:28:51 p.m. EST) and 2:29:21 p.m. PST (5:29:21 p.m. EST) at a speed of 3,760 mph (1.7 kilometers per second). The location of the Sally K. Ride Impact Site is on the southern face of an approximately 1.5-mile-tall (2.5-kilometer) mountain near a crater named Goldschmidt.

More: http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/grail/news/grail20121217.html

[Rick]

Lunar Gravity Field from GRAIL

These two images show variations in the Moon's gravity field as observed by NASA's Gravity Recovery and Interior Laboratory (GRAIL) during its primary mapping mission from March to May 2012.

Go look: http://epod.usra.edu/blog/2012/12/lunar-gravity-field-from-grail.html

[Rick]

Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter Sees GRAIL's Explosive Farewell

Many spacecraft just fade away, drifting silently through space after their mission is over, but not GRAIL. NASA's twin GRAIL (Gravity Recovery and Interior Laboratory) spacecraft went out in a blaze of glory on Dec. 17, 2012, when they were intentionally crashed into a mountain near the moon's north pole.

The successful mission to study the moon's interior took the plunge to get one last bit of science: with the spacecraft kicking up a cloud of dust and gas with each impact, researchers hoped to discover more about the moon's composition. However, with the moon about 380,000 kilometers (over 236,000 miles) away from Earth, the impact plumes would be difficult to observe from here. Fortunately, GRAIL had company. NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) is orbiting the moon as well, busily making high-resolution maps of the lunar surface. With just three weeks notice, the LRO team scrambled to get their orbiter in the right place at the right time to witness GRAIL's fiery finale.

More: http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.php?release=2013-103

[Rick]

NASA's GRAIL Mission Solves Mystery of Moon's Surface Gravity

NASA's Gravity Recovery and Interior Laboratory (GRAIL) mission has uncovered the origin of massive invisible regions that make the moon's gravity uneven, a phenomenon that affects the operations of lunar-orbiting spacecraft.

Because of GRAIL's findings, spacecraft on missions to other celestial bodies can navigate with greater precision in the future.

GRAIL's twin spacecraft studied the internal structure and composition of the moon in unprecedented detail for nine months. They pinpointed the locations of large, dense regions called mass concentrations, or mascons, which are characterized by strong gravitational pull. Mascons lurk beneath the lunar surface and cannot be seen by normal optical cameras.

More: http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.php?release=2013-184

[Rick]

NASA's GRAIL Mission Puts a New Face on the Moon

Understanding lunar impact basins has been hampered by the simple fact that there is a lack of consensus on their size. Most of the largest impact basins on the near side of the moon (the moon's face) have been filled with lava flows, which hide important clues about the shape of the land that could be used for determining their dimensions. The GRAIL mission measured the internal structure of the moon in unprecedented detail for nine months in 2012. With the data, GRAIL scientists have redefined the sizes of massive impact basins on the moon.

More: http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.php?release=2013-322

[Rick]

New lunar crater named after aviation pioneer Earhart

Scientists have discovered a large crater on the Earth-facing side of the Moon - the first detection of its kind in at least a century.

The previously unknown structure has been named after aviation pioneer Amelia Earhart - the first woman to fly solo across the Atlantic.

The 200km-wide buried crater was found in data from Nasa's Grail spacecraft, which mapped the Moon's gravity field.

The results were presented at a major scientific meeting in Texas.

The discovery was the outcome of work by Rohan Sood, Loic Chappaz and Prof H Jay Melosh at Purdue University, where Earhart was a member of the academic faculty from 1935 until her death in 1937.

More: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-31917302

[Rick]

NASA Moon Mission Shares Insights into Giant Impacts

New results from NASA's Gravity Recovery and Interior Laboratory (GRAIL) mission are providing insights into the huge impacts that dominated the early history of Earth's moon and other solid worlds, like Earth, Mars, and the satellites of the outer solar system.

In two papers, published this week in the journal Science, researchers examine the origins of the moon's giant Orientale impact basin. The research helps clarify how the formation of Orientale, approximately 3.8 billion years ago, affected the moon's geology.

Located along the moon's southwestern limb -- the left-hand edge as seen from Earth -- Orientale is the largest and best-preserved example of what's known as a "multi-ring basin." Impact craters larger than about 180 miles (300 kilometers) in diameter are referred to as basins. With increasing size, craters tend to have increasingly complex structures, often with multiple concentric, raised rings. Orientale is about 580 miles (930 kilometers) wide and has three distinct rings, which form a bullseye-like pattern.

More: http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.php?feature=6662