Why in the News?
- Scientists have brought the Propulsion Module (PM) of the Chandrayaan-3 mission back into Earth orbit.
What’s in Today’s Article?
- About Chandrayaan-3 Mission (Objective, Components, etc.)
- About Propulsion Module (Meaning, Role, Significance, etc.)
What is Chandrayaan-3 Mission?
- Chandrayaan-3 is a follow-on mission to Chandrayaan-2 (2019) to demonstrate ISRO’s end-to-end capability in safe landing and roving on the Moon's surface.
- It comprises an indigenous propulsion module, lander module (called Vikram), and a rover (called Pragyaan) with the objective of developing and demonstrating new technologies required for inter-planetary missions.
- The propulsion module, other than carrying the lander and rover configuration till about 100 km lunar orbit, carries the Spectro-polarimetry of Habitable Planet Earth (SHAPE) payload to study spectral and polarimetric measurements of the Earth from lunar orbit.
- On August 23rd, Vikram Lander made its historic touchdown on Moon and subsequently Pragyaan rover was deployed.
- With the success of Chandrayaan-3, India joined United States, Russia, and China as one of the few countries to successfully land on the Moon.
What is a Propulsion Module in Chandrayaan-3?
- The propulsion module is a box-shaped component of the Chandrayaan-3 spacecraft powered by solar panels.
- With regard to Propulsion Module, the main objective was to ferry the Lander module to the final lunar polar circular orbit and separate the Lander.
- Subsequent to separation, SHAPE payload in the PM was also operated.
- The initial plan was to operate this payload for about three months during the mission life of PM.
- On December 4th, the ISRO announced that it had moved Chandrayaan-3's PM out of lunar orbit and placed it high above Earth for a bonus mission, where it now survives on leftover fuel.
- The new experiment will demonstrate technologies that will help Indian scientists bring samples from the moon to Earth someday, ISRO said.
- The ISRO has not revealed what it plans to do with the spacecraft when it runs out of fuel.
Significance of Propulsion Module Coming Back to Earth’s Orbit:
- ISRO added that the following are the main outcome from the return maneuvers carried out on PM related to future missions:
- Planning and execution of trajectory and maneuvers to return from Moon to Earth.
- Development of a software module to plan such a maneuver and its preliminary validation.
- Planning and execution of a gravity assisted flyby across a planet/celestial body.
- Avoiding uncontrolled crashing of the PM on the Moon’s surface at the end of life of PM thus meeting the requirements of no debris creation.
