Tej Web World

Days after the Chandrayaan-I mission to the moon had to be aborted prematurely, US space agency NASA said India’s maiden lunar mission had confirmed the presence of water molecules in the polar region of moon’s surface. Indian Space Research Organisation’s chairman G Madhavan Nair called the finding “path breaking”.

“Water ice on the moon has been something of a holy grail for lunar scientists for a very long time,” said Jim Green, director of the Planetary Science Division at NASA Headquarters in Washington. “This surprising finding has come about through the ingenuity, perseverance and international cooperation between NASA and the India Space Research Organisation”.

ISRO claimed that about 95 per cent of the scientific objectives of Chandrayaan-I had been achieved.

The data from the M3 instrument have been found to be in close agreement with those sent by the Visual and Infrared Mapping Spectrometer (VIMS) aboard NASA’s own Cassini spacecraft that flew by the moon in 1999. A High-Resolution Infrared Imaging Spectrometer on NASA’s Epoxi spacecraft, which flew past the moon in June this year on way to a November 2010 date with comet Hartley 2, also confirmed the finding, the NASA statement said.

Indian scientists are over the moon, after India’s maiden spacecraft, Chandrayaan-1, was confirmed to have found water on the lunar surface.

“The quantity of water was more than we expected. Data collected from Chandrayaan-1 is phenomenal, it may take six months to three years to analyse it,” Nair told reporters over the national television Friday.

America’s National Aeronautics and Space Administration (Nasa) announced Thursday that its Moon Mineralogy Mapper (M3), carried by Chandrayaan under a joint project by Nasa and Isro last October, had discovered water on the moon’s surface.

The presence of water molecules was discovered in June this year but the Chandrayaan mission was aborted end of last month after it lost communication with ISRO ground station.

But Indian scientists claimed that the mission was a success as 95 per cent of the objective was completed, and the spacecraft managed to capture 70,000 images of the moon.

The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) on Wednesday added another feather to its cap by launching the Oceansat-2, a remote sensing satellite that would provide a range of services for the fishermen as well as help scientists get better knowledge of the Indian seas.Six other nano-satellites from different countries were aboard the PSLV-C14 and were all fired into their respective orbits within a time span of 20 minutes.The launch was the 15th consecutive successful flight for ISRO’s evergreen launch vehicle, the PSLV.

The launch was carried out as per schedule at 11.51 am and ended at 12.06 pm.

the rocket first flung out Oceansat-2 at an altitude of 720 km above the earth in a sun-synchronous orbit (SSO), followed by the four nano satellites -- also called Cubesats, each weighing one kg. The remaining two, each weighing eight kg, were attached to the rocket’s fourth stage.

Of the six nano satellites, four are from Germany, one is from Switzerland and one from Turkey. The seventh is a big one, India’s Oceansat-2 weighing 960 kg.

ISRO chief G Madhavan Nair said, “The launch was successful.” He also said that he is “extremely proud to reach the target on time.”

He also congratulated expressed gratitude to his colleagues and said that it would have ‘not been possible without my team’.

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh conveyed his congratulations for the successful launch, Nair said.

The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) achieved a great Milestone on Monday by putting Cartosat-2A, the remote sensing satellite in orbit  with the best-ever Indian imagery resolution offer of 0.8 metre.

The  PSLV-C9 launcher delivered nine other satellites — the experimental Indian Mini Satellite IMS-1 and eight tiny commercial satellites — into a 637-km along with Cartosat-2A  in orbit.

The record multiple launch of 10 satellites in one shot showcased ISRO’s space transportation ability in polar, 1,000-km distances aboard the PSLV launcher.

The ISRO Chairman, Mr G. Madhavan Nair, was reported as saying soon after the launch,

“The mission was perfect and for the first time, 10 satellites were launched within one mission.”

Being the 12th consecutive and successive PSLV flight from the Satish Dhawan Space Centre at Sriharikota,the same  is being used to lift  Chandrayaan-I l mission.

Cartosat-2A has  life expectancy of five years & will support Cartosat-2 that is already transmitting 1-m imageries from January 2007. The cost oh this 690-kg satellite is said to be Rs 240 crore.

“ Cartosat-2A is steerable along as well as across the direction of its movement. It will transmitt invaluable High-resolution data for  urban and rural development applications.

The eight nanosats were built by universities in Canada, Denmark, Germany and the Netherlands. Called NLS-4 (a cluster of six), NLS-5 and RUBIN-8, they together weigh 50 kg. ISRO’s commercial arm Antrix Corporation charged $600,000 (about Rs 2.4 crore) for their launch.

IMS-1 or the Indian Mini Satellite – earlier called the Third World Satellite (TWSAT) — incorporates many new technologies and has miniaturised sub-systems. Apart from the now common multi-spectral camera (Mx), it is testing a hyper-spectral camera (HySI) operating in the visible and near infrared regions of the electromagnetic spectrum.

Aeronautics