Abstract In 1989, a study was conducted of the enhancement to the NASA astronomical program that would ensue, if observations were conducted from a Lunar Outpost. This paper will describe the strategy of the program, and summarize the Lunar Outpost facilities and their scientific rationale. The strategy underlying the astronomical program calls for contemporaneous observations across the entire electromagnetic spectrum. To conduct them, suborbital programs, Explorers, Spacelab, Space Station Freedom, and the Great Observatories are used, together with unique, Moon-based astronomical facilities. The Moon offers a stable base for large systems, long baselines for interferometry, passive cooling, and freedom from light pollution. Large, filled aperture radiation collectors have great sensitivity; long baseline interferometers have high angular resolution. The study concluded that addition of the evolutionary facilities studied for the Lunar Outpost element would increase the sensitivity and angular resolution of the astronomical program by orders of magnitude.
Study of astrophysics from the lunar outpost
Advances in Space Research ; 11 , 2 ; 301-306
1991-01-01
6 pages
Article (Journal)
Electronic Resource
English
Study of astrophysics from the Lunar Outpost
NTRS | 1991
|Springer Verlag | 2009
NTRS | 1992
|NTIS | 1992
|First Lunar Outpost support study
NTRS | 1993
|