Planets and Moons  ID: 3443

Clementine Lunar South Pole

Visualizations by Alex Kekesi Released on August 27, 2007
NASA's next moon mission, the Lunar Reconaissance Orbiter (LRO), will pave the way for future lunar missions by taking high resolution data of the entire lunar body. This animation zooms into one region of high interest, the lunar south pole, as seen by the 1994 Clementine mission. The possibility of frozen water is one of many reasons NASA is interested in this potential landing site. However, many of the craters in this area where frozen water sources are most likely to be found are in constant shadow which inhibited Clementine's ability to see into these craters. These shadows are the very dark areas at the poles center as seen in this animation, and one of the moon's secrets on which LRO should shed some light.
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This animation starts with a computer generated unveiling of the Clementine lunar data (not taking into account the moon's libration as viewed from Earth), and then tilts upward to reveal the lunar south pole.
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Print resolution still of moon's south pole as seen by Clementine.

Visualization Credits

Alex Kekesi (Global Science and Technology, Inc.): Lead Animator
James Garvin (NASA/HQ): Scientist
Please give credit for this item to:
NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center Scientific Visualization Studio

Short URL to share this page:
https://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/3443

Mission:
Clementine

Data Used:
Clementine/HIRES
1994/02/26-1994/05/05
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Note: While we identify the data sets used in these visualizations, we do not store any further details nor the data sets themselves on our site.

Dates of Data Used:
1994/02/26-1994/05/05

This item is part of this series:
The Moon

Keywords:
SVS >> HDTV
SVS >> Lunar
SVS >> Moon
SVS >> Hyperwall
NASA Science >> Planets and Moons