Japan’s SLIM probe has reawakened after surviving the freezing temperatures of its second lunar night lasting two Earth weeks and transmitted new images, Japan’s space agency (Jaxa) announced Thursday, citing AFP.

“We received a response from SLIM last night and confirmed (that) it successfully completed its second night” on the moon, Jaxa said in an X account dedicated to his module, which made a historic moon landing for Japan at the end of the month. January

“Since the sun was still high in the sky last night and the equipment was warm, the navigation camera quickly took normal pictures of the landscape for a short time,” Jaxa added.

The agency also released a black-and-white photo of the rocky surface of a lunar crater taken by its probe.

According to the agency, the data collected also shows that some SLIM temperature sensors and battery cells are starting to fail, but basic functions appear to be delayed.

This is the third total awakening of the SLIM (Smart Lander for Investigating Moon), which made a high-precision landing on January 20, making Japan the fifth country to successfully land on the Earth’s satellite, after the United States, the Soviet Union, China and India.

However, due to an engine problem during the last few tens of meters of descent, SLIM landed at an angle that deprived the west-facing photovoltaic cells of sunlight.

After an initial period of inactivity of about ten days and the first awakening, the probe was put into hibernation and experienced its first lunar night before being put into hibernation in early March.

SLIM landed in a crater less than 300 meters in diameter called Shioli. Before stopping, the spacecraft managed to successfully land two of its mini rovers, which were supposed to conduct an analysis of the rocks of the inner structure of the Moon (lunar mantle), about which very little is still known.

Another probe, Odysseus, sent by the private American company Intuitive Machines, managed to land on the moon in late February, also in an unstable state. However, the company, which had initially hoped to reopen it after the moonlit night, announced on Saturday that it had closed it for good.

Odyssey was the southernmost probe to land on the moon, an area of ​​particular interest to major powers because it contains water in the form of ice.

NASA hopes to resume long-term manned flights to the moon with the Artemis program.

(news.ro)