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CAPSTONE

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CAPSTONE
Illustration of the Cislunar Autonomous Positioning System Technology Operations and Navigation Experiment (CAPSTONE).
NamesCislunar Autonomous Positioning System Technology Operations and Navigation Experiment
Mission typeTechnology demonstration
OperatorNASA
COSPAR ID2022-070A Edit this at Wikidata
SATCAT no.52914Edit this on Wikidata
Mission duration2 years, 6 months and 12 days (elapsed), 9 months (planned)
Spacecraft properties
SpacecraftCAPSTONE
Spacecraft type12U CubeSat
BusCubeSat
ManufacturerAdvanced Space (management)
Tyvak Nano-Satellite Systems (bus)
Stellar Exploration, Inc (propulsion)
Launch mass25 kg (55 lb) [1]
Start of mission
Launch date28 June 2022, 09:55:52 UTC
RocketElectron/Photon HyperCurie
Launch siteMahia, LC-1B[2]
ContractorRocket Lab
Moon orbiter
Orbital insertion13 November 2022
OrbitsNear-rectilinear halo orbit (NRHO)[1]
Orbital parameters
Perigee altitude1,500 km (930 mi)
Apogee altitude70,000 km (43,000 mi)
InclinationElliptic polar orbit

CAPSTONE (Cislunar Autonomous Positioning System Technology Operations and Navigation Experiment) is a lunar orbiter that will test and verify the calculated orbital stability planned for the Lunar Gateway space station. The spacecraft is a 12-unit CubeSat that will also test a navigation system that will measure its position relative to NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) without relying on ground stations. It was launched in 2022, and will spend over 6 months flying around the Moon.

Background

The Lunar Gateway is an in-development space station being planned by several national space agencies since at least 2018, including NASA, European Space Agency (ESA) and Canadian Space Agency (CSA). The Gateway is planned to be placed in a novel lunar orbit that has not been used previously, where it is expected to serve as a communications hub, science laboratory, short-term habitation module, and holding area for rovers and other robots.[3] Gateway is slated to play a major role in NASA's Artemis program.

Computer simulations indicate that this particular orbit — a near-rectilinear halo orbit (NRHO) — offers long-term stability with low propellant requirements for orbital station-keeping,[4] by using a precise balance point in the gravities of Earth and the Moon that offers a stable trajectory.[5]

The main objective of the CAPSTONE mission is to verify the theoretical orbital stability simulations for the Gateway with an actual spacecraft.[6][5][7] CAPSTONE will be the first spacecraft to operate in that unique lunar orbit.[7][5] The spacecraft will also test a navigation system called Cislunar Autonomous Positioning System (CAPS),[8] that will measure its position relative to NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) without relying on ground stations.[5]

Spacecraft

The orbiter is a 12-unit CubeSat.[7][5][6] The US$13.7 million contract was awarded to a private company called Advanced Space, Boulder, Colorado, on 13 September 2019 through a federal Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) contract.[7][5] Advanced Space handled overall project management and some of the spacecraft's key technologies, including its CAPS positioning navigation system,[8] while Tyvak Nano-Satellite Systems, Irvine, California, developed and built the spacecraft bus,[5] and Stellar Exploration, Inc developed its propulsion systems.[9]

Launch

The Electron rocket carrying CAPSTONE seen lifting off from Rocket Lab's Launch Complex in Mahia, New Zealand
CAPSTONE Launch to the Moon
video icon - NASA broadcast (YouTube)

NASA announced on 14 February 2020 that CAPSTONE would be launched aboard a Rocket Lab Electron booster from the company's new launch site at the Mid-Atlantic Regional Spaceport (MARS), Wallops Island, in Virginia.[1] The launch was scheduled for October 2021 but was subsequently delayed and moved to launch from Mahia, LC-1 in New Zealand.[2][10] The launch contract with Rocket Lab has a value of US$9.95 million, according to NASA.[1]

Rocket Lab's new launch pad in Virginia, designated Launch Complex 2, was completed in 2019 and was hoped to be ready to support launches by 2021. The company said the new facility would principally support Electron missions with U.S. government payloads. However, certification of the Autonomous Flight Termination System (AFTS) has taken longer than anticipated, resulting in the launch site being changed to Mahia.[2]

CAPSTONE launched on 28 June 2022. After separating from the second stage, the Rocket Lab's Photon kick stage lifted the orbital apogee into a lunar-transfer orbit over six days by firing the HyperCurie bipropellant engine at perigee six times followed by the Trans-lunar injection (TLI) burn, after which the CAPSTONE spacecraft was deployed on its journey to Moon.[11]

On 5 July 2022, NASA reported that they had lost contact with the spacecraft shortly after separation from Photon, stating their intention to recover 2-way communications the spacecraft and continue the mission.[12] On 6 July, 2022, NASA announced that mission operators had re-established contact with the spacecraft.[13]

Ballistic lunar transfer

CAPSTONE will use a ballistic transfer to the Moon instead of a more conventional direct Hohmann transfer.[14] While trajectories of this type take much longer to reach their destination (about 4 months in this case, compared to about 3 days using a traditional direct transfer) they significantly reduce the propulsion requirements, which can increase the delivered mass.[15] After being ejected from Earth orbit by a series of burns of Rocket Lab's Lunar Photon stage, the spacecraft will reach a distance of about 1.5 million kilometers, where perturbations from the Sun become important.[14] It will then fall back towards the Earth, intercepting the Moon's orbit and finally entering into the intended near-rectilinear halo orbit around the Moon on 13 November 2022.

NASA's CAPSTONE ballistic lunar transfer

Mission

Following a three-month trip to the Moon after launch, the CAPSTONE lunar satellite will spend six months collecting data during this demonstration, flying within 1,000 miles of the Moon’s North Pole on its near pass and 43,500 miles from the South Pole at its farthest.[1][16]

See also

References

  1. ^ a b c d e Clark, Stephen (15 February 2020). "NASA picks Rocket Lab to launch lunar CubeSat mission". Spaceflight Now. Archived from the original on 8 May 2021. Retrieved 18 March 2020.
  2. ^ a b c "Rocket Lab to Launch NASA Funded Commercial Moon Mission from New Zealand" (Press release). Rocket Lab. 6 August 2021. Archived from the original on 8 August 2021. Retrieved 8 August 2021.
  3. ^ "Competition Seeks University Concepts for Gateway and Deep Space Exploration Capabilities". NASA. 11 September 2018. Archived from the original on 17 June 2019. Retrieved 19 September 2018. Public Domain This article incorporates text from this source, which is in the public domain.
  4. ^ "Angelic halo orbit chosen for humankind's first lunar outpost". ESA. 18 July 2019. Archived from the original on 24 June 2021. Retrieved 18 March 2020.
  5. ^ a b c d e f g Foust, Jeff (16 September 2019). "NASA cubesat to test lunar Gateway orbit". SpaceNews. Retrieved 18 March 2020.
  6. ^ a b Torbet, Georgina (15 September 2019). "NASA chooses a CubeSat project to test orbit route around the moon". Digital Trends. Archived from the original on 24 June 2021. Retrieved 18 March 2020.
  7. ^ a b c d "Advanced Space selected to develop CubeSat pathfinder mission". Aerospace Technology. 16 September 2019. Archived from the original on 24 June 2021. Retrieved 18 March 2020.
  8. ^ a b "Cislunar Autonomous Positioning System (CAPS)". Advanced Space. Archived from the original on 24 June 2021. Retrieved 16 September 2019.
  9. ^ Hall, Loura (31 July 2020). "What is CAPSTONE?". NASA. Archived from the original on 3 August 2020. Retrieved 4 August 2020. Public Domain This article incorporates text from this source, which is in the public domain.
  10. ^ David, Leonard (25 August 2021). "CAPSTONE, a small cubesat bound for the moon, is preparing for an October launch". Space.com. Archived from the original on 27 August 2021. Retrieved 27 August 2021.
  11. ^ Foust, Jeff (4 July 2022). "CAPSTONE heads to the moon". SpaceNews. Retrieved 5 July 2022.
  12. ^ Shields, Todd (5 July 2022). "Capstone Spacecraft on Moon Mission Loses Contact, NASA Says". Bloomberg. Retrieved 5 July 2022.
  13. ^ "CAPSTONE Update: Communications Re-Established". 6 July 2022. Retrieved 6 July 2022.
  14. ^ a b "CAPSTONE Uses Gravity on Unusual, Efficient Route to the Moon". NASA. 19 May 2022.
  15. ^ "Ballistic Lunar Transfers to Near Rectilinear Halo Orbit". Advanced Space, LLC. Retrieved 5 July 2022.
  16. ^ "CAPSTONE Launches to Test New Orbit for NASA's Artemis Moon Missions". 28 June 2022.
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