Chandrayaan 2 will carry NASA's Laser instruments to the moon

The engineering model of the rover of Chandrayaan-2 built by ISRO Satellite Center, Bangluru. Credit : K. Murali Kumar 

India's moon mission Chandrayaan-2 is going to be launched next month and will carry NASA's laser equipment to the moon along with it. According to the officials of the American Space Agency, this will help scientists to accurately measure the distance of the Moon.

During the Lunar and Planetary Science Conference, held in the Texas, US last week, NASA had confirmed that Chandrayaan-2 and the Israeli lander Beresheet will each carry NASA-owned Laser Retroreflector Arrays.

India's lunar mission Chandrayaan-2 is a completely indigenous probe with a little American help: ISRO 

"We are trying to populate the entire surface with as much laser reflectors as we can possibly get there", said Lori Glaze, the acting director of the Planetary Science Department at NASA's Science Mission Directorate, as reported by Space.com.

Orbiter and lander in stacked configuration with the rover inside the lander. 
Source:http://www.vssc.gov.in/VSSC/index.php/12-exploration

Retroreflectors are sophisticated mirrors that reflect the laser light signals sent from Earth. These signals can help detect accurately where the lander is, which scientists can use to precisely measure the distance of the Moon from Earth. 

While five such instruments already exist on the lunar surface, they have some flaws, according to Simone Dell' Agnello, a physicist at the National Institute for Nuclear Physics National Laboratory in Italy. 

"The existing reflectors are big ones", said Dell' Agnello adding that individual reflectors instead of arrays would waste fewer laser pulses and allow more precise measurements of the surface of the moon. 

Those analyses could become so detailed that scientists could see the daily rise and fall of any lander surface the device is resting on, as that surface expands and contracts with the moon's dramatic temperature changes. 

It is worth mentioning that last year speculations were made that Chandrayaan-2 mission will be postponed. This mission was to go in October last year, but later it was coming out in 2019.

India's ambitious mission, Chandrayaan-2 delayed again, will Israel go forth from India?

It was being said that due to this delay, Israel has got an opportunity to reach the moon before India. The first picture of India's Moon Rover is part of ISRO's Rs.800 crore project - Chandrayaan-2. 

During the Second Journey of the Moon, India's plan is to get soft landings near the South Pole and to get information related to the surface of the moon through this small rover of six wheels. The reasons for the delay are being described as technical difficulties.

In this regard, Dr. M. Annadurai (Director, UR Rao Satellite Center, Bengaluru) had told, that the date of launch of Chandrayaan-2 has been decided to be in the next year i.e. 2019. He had told that Chandrayaan-2 can be sent by February next year and the rocket may be launched in January, before Chandrayaan-2 was to be launched in October this year.

Dr. M. Annadurai said in the conversation that instead of GSLV Mk II, now GSLV Mk III will land on the moon in February, so the launch will now take place anytime in January. 

Till now, Russia, America and China have successfully performed soft landing on the surface of the moon. Now two Asian countries- India and Israel- are in the race to reach the moon. Let's see who comes at number four.