Attention was focused on a new American project to build a large-scale radio telescope on the lunar surface. The lunar radio telescope, named FarView, is expected to become an advanced base for more precise observation of planets in the solar system.
A joint research team of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, the California Institute of Technology (Caltech), and Lunar Resources, a private space development company, introduced the FarView project to build a radio telescope on the lunar surface through official channels on the 27th.
The key to FarView is to install a radio telescope array on the lunar surface of about 200 km2. It consists of approximately 100,000 dipole antennas, most of which are constructed by robots. The robot sent by spacecraft collects the lunar regolith, that is, rock debris from the surface, extracts oxygen and metal, and extracts materials to manufacture antennas, solar cells, and power lines.
A Caltech official said, “Farview is also a stage for testing ISRU (in-situ resource utilization) technology that directly utilizes the resources of celestial bodies outside the Earth. Once extensive farview is completed on the lunar surface as planned, we will be able to use smartphones placed on Pluto. “It achieves detection accuracy,” he explained.
NASA, along with Caltech and Lunar Resources, is pursuing the FarView project to install a large-scale radio telescope on the lunar surface.
He added, “Once Farview is in operation, humanity will have access to space observation information that cannot be obtained on Earth,” and added, “It will also bring important knowledge about the birth of the universe to humanity.”
The temperature of the universe that was just born from the Big Bang is thought to be tens of billions of degrees Celsius. The temperature of outer space, which was quite hot, dropped 380,000 years later when electrons and protons combined to create hydrogen atoms. This phenomenon, in which light can finally travel freely in a straight line, is called the gam of the universe. Not long after the creation of hydrogen, the universe was a dark place without stars or galaxies.
A NASA official said, “There were no celestial bodies that emitted light during the dark ages of the universe, but hydrogen emitted weak radio waves with a wavelength of 21 cm, and some of that light still exists in space.” He added, “It is a faint light that can never be observed from Earth.” “The purpose of FarView is to accurately capture the conditions of the early universe,” he said.
Farview’s imagination. ISRU technology will be demonstrated to not only observe astronomical objects but also extract construction materials using materials from the moon.
Easier said than done, but building a large-scale radio telescope on the lunar surface is quite difficult. It costs astronomical amounts of money to transport materials, people, food, and water from Earth to the Moon. According to NASA, it takes more than $1 million (about 1.3 billion won) to send 1 kg of cargo to the moon.
An official from Luna Resources said, “Considering this, local resource procurement is a technology that must be completed for humanity to advance into space in earnest,” and added, “Farview has an observation purpose, but it is also an experiment to determine whether humanity can realize ISRU technology.” “It’s a stage,” he said.
Farview is expected to take more than 10 years to complete and cost at least 2 billion dollars (about 2.624 trillion won). An official from Luna Resources emphasized, “In the 16th century, when mankind had just succeeded in circumnavigating the world, people could not have imagined the advanced future we have today,” and added, “Scientists must move despite criticism that they are reckless. We will open the door to the future.” did it
Reporter Jeong Ian anglee@sputnik.kr
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