The advanced Moon micro-imager experiment (AMIE) on SMART-1: Scientific goals and expected results

Patrick Pinet (1) , Priscilla Cerroni (2) , Jean-Luc Josset (3) , Stéphane Beauvivre (3) , Serge Chevrel (1) , Karri Muinonen (4) , Yves Langevin (5) , Maria Antonella Barucci (6, 7) , Maria Cristina de Sanctis (2) , Yurij G. Shkuratov (8) , V. Shevchenko (9) , P. Plancke (10) , B. A. Hofmann (11) , M. Josset (12) , Pascale Ehrenfreund (13) , Zoran Sodnik (14) , Detlef Koschny (14) , Miguel Almeida (14) , B. Foing (14)

1 OMP - Observatoire Midi-Pyrénées
2 Università degli Studi di Roma Tor Vergata [Roma] = University of Rome Tor Vergata
3 SPACE-X, Space Exploration Institute
4 Helsinki Observatory
5 IAS - Institut d'astrophysique spatiale
6 LESIA - Laboratoire d'études spatiales et d'instrumentation en astrophysique
7 Pôle Planétologie du LESIA
8 Astronomical Institute of Kharkov National University
9 SSIA - Shternberg State Institute of Astronomy
10 Power and Control Data division, ESA-ESTEC
11 Natural History Museum
12 IGUN - Institut de Géologie de l'université de Neuchatel
13 Leiden Observatory
14 Space Science Department, European Space Agency

The advanced Moon micro-imager experiment (AMIE) is the imaging system on board ESA mission to the Moon SMART-1; it makes use of a miniaturised detector and micro-processor electronics developed by SPACE X in the frame of the ESA technical programme. The AMIE micro-imager will provide high resolution CCD images of selected lunar areas and it will perform colour imaging through three filters at 750, 915 and 960 nm with a maximum resolution of 46 m/pixel at the perilune of 500 km. Specific scientific objectives will include (1) imaging of high latitude regions in the southern hemisphere, in particular the South Pole Aitken basin (SPA) and the permanently shadowed regions close to the South Pole, (2) determination of the photometric properties of the lunar surface from observations at different phase angles (physical properties of the regolith), (3) multi-band imaging for constraining the chemical and mineral composition of the surface, (4) detection and characterisation of lunar non-mare volcanic units, (5) study of lithological variations from impact craters and implications for crustal heterogeneity. The AMIE micro-imager will also support a Laser-link experiment to Earth, an On Board Autonomous Navigation investigation and a Lunar libration experiment coordinated with radio science measurements.

Domaines: Astrophysique [astro-ph]

Patrick Pinet, Priscilla Cerroni, Jean-Luc Josset, Stéphane Beauvivre, Serge Chevrel, et al.. The advanced Moon micro-imager experiment (AMIE) on SMART-1: Scientific goals and expected results. Planetary and Space Science, 2005, 53, pp.1309-1318. ⟨10.1016/j.pss.2005.06.003⟩. ⟨hal-03786193⟩