to determine the locations of lunar landers more accurately. They will be attached to most of the landers from United States companies as part of initiative. LRAs are inexpensive, small, and lightweight, allowing future lunar orbiters or landers to locate them on the Moon.
Credit: NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center/Scientific Visualization Studio James Tralie . Lead Producer Xiaoli Sun : Scientist This photograph shows a mockup laser retroreflector array at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Maryland, demonstrating the basic design: a metallic semi-hemispheric disc, with eight silica glass cubes embedded in its surface.LRAs are designed to reflect laser light shone on them from a large range of angles. Dr.
“We have been putting these on satellites and ranging to them from ground-based lasers for years,” said Dr. Xiaoli Sun, also of NASA Goddard and principal investigator for the LRA project. “Then, twenty years ago, someone got the idea to put them on the landers. Then you can range to those landers from orbit and know where they are on the surface.”
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