PDS_VERSION_ID = PDS3 LABEL_REVISION_NOTE = " LISA GADDIS and CHRIS ISBELL, 2010-04-30, CIsbell, Post Review, 2010-10-01" RECORD_TYPE = STREAM OBJECT = MISSION MISSION_NAME = "LUNAR ORBITER" OBJECT = MISSION_HOST INSTRUMENT_HOST_ID = {LO3,LO4,LO5} OBJECT = MISSION_TARGET TARGET_NAME = MOON END_OBJECT = MISSION_TARGET END_OBJECT = MISSION_HOST OBJECT = MISSION_INFORMATION MISSION_ALIAS_NAME = "LO" MISSION_OBJECTIVES_SUMMARY = "As described in MISSION_DESC below." MISSION_START_DATE = 1966-08-10 MISSION_STOP_DATE = 1968-01-31 MISSION_DESC = " LUNAR ORBITER PROGRAM OVERVIEW ============================== The NASA Lunar Orbiter (LO) program, in conjunction with the Ranger and Surveyor missions of the 1960's, was part of a plan for unmanned lunar exploration designed to assist in characterizing the lunar surface so that humans could land safely on the Moon by Project Apollo (e.g., Taback, 1964; Kosofsky and Broome, 1965; Kosofsky and El-Baz, 1970). Ranger provided early close-up television views of the lunar surface, and Surveyor obtained measurements of surface properties such as bearing strength at specific locations. The five unmanned Lunar Orbiter missions, launched on Atlas-Agena D vehicles by NASA in 1966 and 1967 (Table 1), were designed to photograph the lunar surface at a variety of spatial resolutions prior to the Apollo landed missions so that earlier information could be extrapolated to a wider range of possible landing sites. The Lunar Orbiter missions carried a unique dual framing camera photographic system designed and built by Eastman Kodak in which two simultaneous exposures were made on film on the spacecraft, processed on board, and then read out and transmitted by video to Earth (e.g., Beeler and Michlovitz, 1969; Hansen, 1970; Bowker and Hughes, 1971). The Lunar Orbiter project, which remains one of NASA's most successful, was carried out by the Boeing Company under the management of the NASA Langley Research Center. Construction and launching of five Lunar Orbiter spacecraft to the Moon had a total estimated cost of $163 million (Kloman, 1972). All five Lunar Orbiter missions operated successfully and 99% of the Moon was photographed with a resolution of 60 m or better. Altogether the orbiters returned 2180 high resolution and 882 medium resolution frames. The first three missions obtained images of 20 potential lunar landing sites; these missions were flown at ~low altitude in low inclination orbits and were focused on the area of primary interest for Apollo, bounded by latitude +- 10 degree latitude and +- 60 degrees longitude (an area of ~40,000 square kilometers) on the lunar near side. The fourth and fifth missions were devoted to broader scientific objectives and were flown in high altitude polar orbits. Lunar Orbiter IV alone photographed the entire near side and 95% of the far side, and Lunar Orbiter V completed the far side coverage and acquired medium (20 m) and high (2 m) resolution images of 36 sites of high scientific interest. Table 1. Lunar Orbiter Camera Operational Characteristics. Photographic Lunar Lunar Lunar Lunar Lunar Parameters Orbiter I Orbiter II Orbiter III Orbiter IV Orbiter V ----------------- --------- --------- --------- --------- --------- Launch Date 8/10/66 11/6/66 2/4/67 5/4/67 8/1/67 Periselene (km) 40.5 41 44 2668 97 Aposelene (km) 1857 1871 1847 6151 6092 Inclination (deg) 12 12 21 85.5 85 Period (h) 3.5 3.5 3.5 12 8.5, 3.0 Impact -Date 10/29/66 10/11/67 10/9/67 10/31/67 1/31/68 -Location 7N, 161E 3N, 119E 14.3N, 93W ?, 22-30W 3S, 83W Acquisition Dates 8/18-29/66 11/18-25/66 2/15-23/67 5/11-26/67 8/6-18/67 Quantity of Frames -High resolution 42 609 477 419 633 -Medium resolution 187 208 149 127 211 Altitude range for photography (km) 44-1581 41-1519 44-1463 2668-6151 97-5758 Highest resolution -Periselene (m) 8 1 1 58 2 -Aposelene (m) 275 33 32 134 125 Framelet width at periselene (m) -High resolution 200 170 185 11350 420 -Medium resolution 1500 1300 1400 85100 3200 Program Chronology from http://www.astronautix.com/craft/lunbiter.htm 1963-08-30 Lunar Orbiter program approved 1963-12-20 Boeing Company selected to build five Lunar Orbiter spacecraft 1964-03-25 Boeing Company received NASA's go-ahead to develop Lunar Orbiter spacecraft 1965-10-22 10 areas on the Moon selected at LO subjects encompassing most major types of lunar terrain 1966-02-01 Lunar Orbiter program status discussed 1966-08-10 Lunar Orbiter I launched 1966-11-06 Lunar Orbiter II launched 1967-02-05 Lunar Orbiter III launched 1967-05-04 Lunar Orbiter IV launched 1967-08-01 Lunar Orbiter V launched Spacecraft The Lunar Orbiter missions were launched aboard Atlas-Agena D vehicles from Cape Canaveral (Kennedy Space Center) in Florida at roughly three-month intervals between 1966-08-10 and 1968-08-01 (Table 1). The spacecraft was a three-axis stabilized vehicle with a normal weight of 383 kg and was designed to be mounted within an aerodynamic nose shroud on top of the ATLAS/AGENA launch vehicle. The main bus of each Lunar Orbiter spacecraft was shaped like a truncated cone (1.65 meters tall and 1.5 meters in diameter at the base) and weighed 390 kilograms at launch (e.g., Byers, 1977). The spacecrafts had three decks supported by trusses and an arch. The equipment deck at the base of each spacecraft contained a 12 amp-hr nickel-cadmium battery, transponder, flight programmer, inertial reference unit (IRU), Canopus star tracker, command decoder, multiplex encoder, traveling wave tube amplifier (TWTA), and the photographic system. Four solar panels extended out from this deck approximately perpendicular to the spacecraft centerline with a span of 3.72 meters. Power of 375 W was provided by four solar arrays containing 10,856 n/p solar cells that ran the spacecraft and charged the 12 A-h nickel-cadmium battery. Also extending out from the base of the spacecraft were a high-gain antenna on a 1.32 meter boom and a low-gain antenna on a 2.08 meter boom. Above the equipment deck, the middle deck held the velocity control engine, propellant, oxidizer and pressurization tanks, Sun sensors, and micrometeoroid detectors. The third deck consisted of a heat shield to protect the spacecraft from the firing of the velocity control engine. The nozzle of the engine protruded through the center of the shield. Mounted on the perimeter of the top deck were four attitude control thrusters. The required operating power of 375 W was provided by the four solar arrays containing 10,856 n/p solar cells which would directly run the spacecraft and also charge the battery. The batteries were used during brief periods of occultation when no solar power was available. Propulsion for major maneuvers was provided by the velocity control engine mounted on a gimbal, a hypergolic 100-pound-thrust Marquardt rocket motor. Three-axis stabilization and attitude control were provided by four one-pound nitrogen gas jets. Navigational data was provided by five Sun sensors, Canopus star sensor, and the IRU equipped with internal gyroscopes. Communications used a 10 W transmitter and the directional 1 meter diameter high-gain antenna for transmission of photographs and a 0.5 W transmitter and omnidirectional low- gain antenna for other communications. Both antennas operated in S-band at 2295 MHz. Thermal control was maintained by a multilayer aluminized Mylar and Dacron thermal blanket which covered the main bus, special paint, insulation, and small heaters. The blanket protected the spacecraft from the firing of the velocity control engine and the nozzle of the engine protruded through the center of the shield. Program Management http://www.lpi.usra.edu/resources/lunarorbiter/documents/NASA-CR-1054.pdf The successful Lunar Orbiter program required the integrated and cooperative efforts of government agencies, private contractors, subcontractors and worldwide data collection system of the NASA Deep Space Network (DSN. As the prime contractor, Boeing was responsible to the Lunar Orbiter Project Office of the NASA Langley Research Center for overall project management and implementation of the complete operating system and also for effective working relationships with all participating government agencies. The NASA Lewis Research Center provided the Atlas-Agena launch vehicle and associated services. The Air Force Eastern Test Range (AFETR) provided facilities equipment and support to test, check out, assemble, launch and track the spacecraft and launch vehicle. AFETR also controlled the Atlas launch vehicle trajectory and monitored Agena performance to ensure orbital separation. The Deep Space Network (DSN) was managed by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory and consisted of the Space Flight Operations Facility (SFOF)and the Deep Space Stations (DSS)to provide two-way communications with the spacecraft, data collection, and data processing. Facilities were also provided for operational control. Goddard Space Flight Center was responsible for the worldwide network of communication lines to ensure prompt distribution of information between the tracing stations and SFOF. Objectives The Lunar Orbiter program had three primary objectives: 1) To obtain detailed lunar topographic and geologic information of a variety of lunar terrains to assess their suitability as landing sites by Apollo and Surveyor spacecraft and to increase scientific understanding of the Moon; 2) To provide precision trajectory information that could be used to improve the definition of the lunar gravitational field; and 3) To provide measurements of micrometeoroid and radiation flux in the lunar environment for spacecraft performance analysis and safety. To achieve these objectives, the Lunar Orbiter spacecraft were each equipped with a photographic subsystem and instruments to collect selenodetic, radiation intensity, and micrometeoroid impact data. Instrumentation Each of the five Lunar Orbiter spacecraft carried instrumentation to photograph the lunar surface and to measure lunar gravity, radiation, and dust (e.g., Byers, 1977). The photographic program was led by Leon J. Kosofsky of the NASA Lunar Orbiter Program Office. The non-photographic experiments were designed and led by scientists of the NASA Langley Research Center: selenodesy experiments by William H. Michael, radiation experiments by Trutz Foelsche, and dust experiments by Charles A. Gurtler and William H. Kinnard. Managed by The Boeing Company and built by the Eastman Kodak Company, the Lunar Orbiter photographic subsystems of represented a scaled-down version of the Eastman Kodak photographic systems in use in the early 1960's by the U.S. Air Force. Photographic instrumentation was housed in a pressurized, temperature-controlled container and each had dual-lens cameras, a film processing unit, a readout scanner, and a film handling apparatus. Both Lunar Orbiter lenses, a 610-mm narrow angle high-resolution (HR) lens and an 80-mm wide-angle medium resolution (MR) lens, obtained photographs simultaneously and were designed to place their frame exposures on a single roll of 70-mm Kodak SO 243 aerial film so the area imaged in the HR frames were centered within the MR frame areas. Each camera operated at a fixed aperture of f/5.6 with controllable shutter speeds of 0.01, 0.02, or 0.04 second. The field of view for the 80-mm camera was 44.2 by 37.9 degrees and for the 610-mm camera was 20.4 by 5.16 degrees. The dual cameras each had the same line of sight (i.e., the boresights of the two cameras were coincident) but different fields of view and ground resolutions. The film was moved during exposure to compensate for the spacecraft velocity, and it was developed on board using the established Kodak semi-dry Bimat process, dried, scanned, and the images transmitted as a video signal by the communications system back to Earth. The received video signal was routed into the ground reconstruction electronics (GRE) where it was (1) recorded onto magnetic tapes and (2) converted into an intensity-modulated line on the face of a cathode-ray tube that was then used to expose 35-mm film in a continuous motion camera to reconstruct the film strips or 'framelets'. The reconstructed framelets were approximately 18 mm wide and 40 cm long, and their scale was 7.18 times spacecraft scale. These GRE framelets represented the original flight data and were considered 'zero generation' film positives. The framelets were reassembled into frames in their entirety for MR frames and into three sub- frames for HR frames (so-called H1, H2, H3). The Lunar Orbiter framelets on magnetic tapes were higher quality and were used to make first-generation or master 35-mm negatives. Second and third generation film negatives were also made quickly to support mission operations and planning, but after the mission was completed, a new set of master film positives was created from the modulated GRE data and used to make 20 x 24 inch contact prints (new 'first generation master negatives') for public dissemination. The resulting outstanding views were of generally very high spatial resolution (e.g., ~1 to 1000 m, depending on the mission) and covered a substantial portion of the lunar surface. However, these products contained anomalies such as 'venetian blind' striping, missing or duplicated data, and frequent saturation effects that hampered their use. Prior to being placed onboard the spacecraft, the photographic film was exposed with strip numbers, a nine-level grayscale bar, resolving power chart, and reseau marks. Reseau marks provided a means for determination and correction of image distortions introduced by the system subsequent to the optical imaging on the spacecraft film. The instrumentation for the Lunar Orbiter gravity, shape, and physical properties ('selenodesy') experiments included a power source, an antenna, and a transponder. High-frequency radio signals were received by the spacecrafts from Earth tracking stations and then retransmitted back to the stations to provide data on signal propagation times (range) and doppler frequency measurements (range rate; e.g., Lorell, 1970). Tracking data coverage was continuous while the spacecraft was in cislunar space (i.e., situated between the Earth and the Moon) and visible from Earth. Three Lunar Orbiters (II, III and V) were tracked simultaneously from August to October 1967. Information was acquired during the cislunar, the first, second, and third ellipse, and the extended mission (from the end of the photographic mission to lunar impact) phases of the mission. Doppler, ranging, hour angle points, and declination angle points data were accumulated during tracking. The quality of recorded selenodetic data typically ranged from good to excellent. All five Lunar Orbiter spacecraft also carried two proton-radiation detectors to measure the approximate doses of radiation that might be experienced by the Lunar Orbiter film and later by astronauts in space and on the lunar surface. Radiation (primarily cosmic ray events was measured by two cesium iodide (CsI) dosimeters, one of which was shielded by 0.2 gram of aluminum per square centimeter and the other by 2.0 grams aluminum per square centimeter. During Lunar Orbiter operations, the radiation detector monitored conditions to protect the film from cosmic rays. Each of the five Lunar Orbiter spacecraft also carried 20 dust detectors for measuring the number of micrometeoroids in the lunar environment (e.g., Byers, 1977). These half-cylinder-shaped detectors were located outside the thermal blanket on the middle deck periphery, were covered by a beryllium- copper shell, and were pressurized with helium gas. A rupture of the .025 mm-thick shell by a micrometeoroid released the gas pressure and activated a pressure-sensitive switch to count the event. These data, along with radiation measurements, were used to assess the near-lunar environment, to compare meteoroid hazard near the Earth and Moon, and to help determine the amount of protection needed for the Apollo capsules, spacesuits, and equipment. Results The five Lunar Orbiter spacecraft returned more than 1654 high-quality photographs of the Moon taken from lunar orbit (e.g., Hansen, 1970). Of those, photographs of 840 lunar near side areas successfully addressed Project Apollo requirements and were obtained primarily during Missions I, II, and III. Following Lunar Orbiter III, eight potential Apollo landing sites were selected and five were identified for additional imaging. The remaining 814 photographs were taken primarily during Missions IV and V and include 703 of the lunar near side, 105 of the far side, and 6 of Earth. Lunar Orbiter IV and V photographs provide broad coverage of nearly the entire Moon and detailed coverage for 88 areas on the near side, including the five promising Apollo landing sites identified earlier. Lunar Orbiter photographs were taken from flight altitudes of ~41 km above the near side to ~6100 km above the far side and ground resolution varied from 1 to 275 m (Table 1).In the five missions, farside coverage was nearly complete with good photo quality. Nearside photo resolution ranged from 2 to 7 meters depending on spacecraft altitude and slant range. Tracking data of Lunar Orbiter spacecraft position and speed were used to determine how the Moon's gravity affected the orbit of each Lunar Orbiter spacecraft. As a result, the lunar gravity field and global structure were successfully characterized (e.g., Lorell, 1970; Ferrari, 1975; Ananda, 1975). Also, unusual concentrations of mass ('mascons', Muller and Sjogren, 1968) associated with mare fill in many near side lunar basins were discovered through analyses of the Lunar Orbiter selenodetic data. In combination with the Lunar Orbiter photographic data, Lunar Orbiter selenodetic data provided fundamental information on the nature of the lunar surface, its stratigraphy, and chronology that laid the groundwork for the Apollo program and led to new models of the composition and structure of the interior of the Moon (e.g., Solomon, 1974). LO micrometeoroid experiments recorded 22 impacts showing the average micrometeoroid flux near the Moon was about two orders of magnitude greater than in interplanetary space but slightly less than the near Earth environment (e.g., Gurtler and Grew, 1968). Results of the Lunar Orbiter radiation experiments showed that all events recorded were of significance to a man in space only where shielding was light, such as in a space suit or in the Lunar Module (Foelsche, 1968). These experiments confirmed that the design of Apollo hardware would protect the astronauts from average and greater-than-average short term exposure to solar particle events. All Lunar Orbiter spacecraft were eventually commanded to crash on the Moon before their attitude control gas ran out so they would not present navigational or communications hazards to later Apollo flights." END_OBJECT = MISSION_INFORMATION [The references further below will be added to ref.cat with reference entries then placed here per the following example] OBJECT = MISSION_REFERENCE_INFORMATION REFERENCE_KEY_ID = "GADDISETAL2009" END_OBJECT = MISSION_REFERENCE_INFORMATION END Ananda, M., 1975, Farside lunar gravity from a mass point model, Proc. 6th Lunar Science Conference, pp. 2785-2796. Anon, 1970, Atlas and Gazetteer of the Near Side of the Moon. NASA SP-241. Beeler, M. AND K. Michlovitz, 1969, Lunar Orbiter Photographic Data, Data Users' Note, NSSDC 69-05, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center. [http://www.lpi.usra.edu/resources/lunarorbiter/documents/LO_DUNOTES.pdf] Boeing Company, The, 1967, Lunar Orbiter III: Mission System Performance, NASA CR-66461, 167 pp. Boeing Company, The, 1967, Lunar Orbiter III: Photography, NASA CR-984, 45 pp. Boeing Company, The, 1968, Photographic Mission Summary, NASA CR-1069. Bowker, D.E. and J.K. Hughes, 1971, Lunar Orbiter Photographic Atlas of the Moon, NASA SP-206. Broome, G.C. and J.C. Moorman, 1967, The Lunar Orbiter Photographic System, Presented at the Annual Conference of Photographic Scientists and Engineers, 36 pp. Byers, B.K., 1977, Destination Moon: A history of the Lunar Orbiter program, NASA Headquarters, TM X-3487, Wash, D.C. Crew, G.W. and C.A. Gurtler, 1971, The Lunar Orbiter Meteoroid Experiments: Description and Results from Five Spacecraft, NASA Technical Note, NASA TN D- 6266. Eppler, D., 1992, Data Collection by Robotic Precursors in Support of Project Apollo: Data Requirements, Program Review, and Evaluation of Results, Explorations Programs Office, Johnson Space Center, JSC-37000 Elle, B.L., C.S. Heinmiller, P.J. Fromme, and A.E. Neumer, 1967, The Lunar Orbiter Photographic System, J. Soc. Motion Pic. and Telev. Eng., vol. 76, no. 8, Aug. 1967, pp. 733-782.This is actually a number of papers by different authors on different aspects of the photo system. Do you want to keep it like this with just the first paper and all the page numbers listed, or do you want to break it up and reference all the papers individually? Ferrari, A.J., 1975, Lunar gravity: The first far side map, Science, 27, #4195, pp. 1297-1300. Foelsche, T., 1968, Radiation measurements in LO I-V (Period August 10, 1966 - January 30, 1968), NASA Langley Research Center, paper presented at the Manned Spacecraft Center Seminar, Houston, TX, June 21, 1968. Gillis, Jeffery J., 2004, Digital Lunar Orbiter Photographic Atlas of the Moon, Lunar and Planetary Institute, LPI Contribution No. 1205 Gurtler, C.A. and G.W. Grew, 1968, Meteoroid Hazard near Moon, Science, 161, pp. 462-464. Hansen, Thomas P., 1970, Guide to Lunar Orbiter Photographs, NASA SP-242. Jaffe, Leonard D., 1970, Recent Observations of the Moon By Spacecraft, Space Sci. Rev., vol. 9, no. 4, pp. 491-616. Kloman, Erasmus, 1972, Unmanned Space Project Management: Surveyor and Lunar Orbiter. NASA SP-4901, 41 pages, published by NASA, Washington, D.C. Kosofsky, L.J. and G.C. Broome, 1965, Lunar Orbiter: A Photographic Satellite, Journal of the Society of Motion Picture and Television Engineers, 74, 773-778. Kosofsky, Leon J. and Farouk El-Baz, 1970, The Moon as Viewed by Lunar Orbiter, NASA SP-200. Lorell, J., 1970, Lunar Orbiter gravity analysis, The Moon, 1, 190-231. Muller, P.M. and W.L. Sjogren, 1968, Mascons: Lunar mass concentrations, Science, 161, #3842, pp. 680-684. Solomon, S.C., 1974, Density within the Moon and implications for lunar composition, Earth, Moon and Planets, 9, pp. 147-166. Taback, Israel, 1964, Lunar Orbiter: Its Mission and Capabilities, 10th Annual Meeting of the American Astronautical Society, May 4-7, 1964, 33 p. Boeing 1968 LO V Photographic Mission Report has a Program Summary staring on page 135.