“The lunar orbiter is scheduled to launch next August
Succeeded in developing polarized camera’Polcam’
It seems to be the first observation in the world of solar reflection
The U.S. sends humanity to the moon project
In discussion with four payload development screws”
Proof of’solar wind’… Nickname for’Soil Detective’
“Not only the United States, China, and the United Arab Emirates (UAE), but also Russia, the European Space Agency (ESA), and India have already successfully entered Mars orbit, and Japan is preparing to explore Mars. The flow of space exploration is changing.”
In commemoration of the 50th anniversary of the lunar landing in 2019, Shim Chae-kyung (39, photo), a young scientist who will lead future lunar exploration by Nature, a world-class scientific journal, is a senior researcher at the Korea Astronomy Institute (former professor of space science, Kyunghee University). He said that the US Mars exploration rover’Percivirence’ recently landed on Mars and successfully tested it, and Chinese and UAE Mars probes also successfully entered Mars orbit last month, and space exploration around the world is fiercely competing. . Researcher Shim said, “This exploration has made great progress, especially in that it brings a rover and a drone, which is a mobile exploration robot, to collect the soil and bring it to Earth.”
He explained that Korea’s space exploration technology is still in its infancy, but is making a leap forward. The Korean lunar orbiter is scheduled to launch in August 2022. Development of the polarizing camera’PolCam’ to be mounted on the Korean lunar orbiter where Researcher Shim participated was completed in January. “A polarized camera is a device that measures how sunlight is reflected off the moon’s surface. These observations can provide important information for future lunar research and rover landings by understanding the particle size, structure, and characteristics of the lunar surface.” It is the first in the world to observe the lunar surface with a polarizing camera near the moon.
The United States is promoting the’Artemis’ project to send humanity to the moon in 2024. The Korea Astronomical Research Institute participates in the’Commercial Moon Payload Service (CLPS)’, which NASA (National Aeronautics and Space Administration) starts this year. CLPS is a project to send a lunar lander developed by a private company to the moon. They said that they are discussing whether to mount with screws after developing four payloads that can be loaded onto the CLPS.
Researcher Shim said, “Attempts to send humans to the Moon and Mars will continue in the future.” “The moon is full moon during the day and the full moon is at night, and the daytime temperature rises to 90 degrees, and at night it reaches minus 200 degrees, so there is a limit for humans to live. Mars, which has a similar daily cycle to Earth, is more advantageous than the Moon. However,’terraforming’, which creates an environment in which humans can survive on the moon or Mars, seems to be a very distant future.”
Researcher Shim is one of the few researchers in the field of planetary science in Korea, and began researching the moon in 2014. In 2017, it was the first in the world to prove that the main cause of cosmic weathering on the moon’s surface was the’solar wind’, which sparked a sensation in the academic world. This is why Nature referred to him as a’soil detective’. Recently, it has been discovered that the brightness of the lunar surface is related to the iron content, and color and brightness change as the content changes due to cosmic weathering.
Researcher Shim said, “Behind the development of science and technology in advanced countries, space research plays a big role.” I want to provide it.” He recently published an essay “Astronomical Scholars Don’t See the Stars” (Literature Township), which has sold more than 10,000 copies in 15 days, making it a hot topic.
Reporter Park Hyun-soo phs2000@munhwa.com