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Date: May 21, 2012

Title: Encore:LCROSS and the Land of the Lunar Shadows

Organization: NASA Lunar Science Institute

Links: (NLSI) http://lunarscience.arc.nasa.gov/

Music courtesy of Ben Bedford, from his “Land of the Shadows” CD. Used by permission.
http://benbedford.com/

Description: The permanently shadowed craters on the poles of the Moon have long been a mystery, because we could never see what was inside. But now the LCROSS mission has allowed us to take a peek inside one of those craters at the Moon’s south pole. If you remember back in October of 2009, NASA successfully slammed part of a Centaur rocket in to Cabeus crater on the Moon, sending a plume of ejecta up into the sunlight. The “shepherding” LCROSS spacecraft –which stands for the Lunar Crater Observation and Sensing Satellite followed close on the impactor’s heels, to see what materials could be found inside this dark, shadowed, and unstudied region of the Moon. Recently, the LCROSS team released their most recent findings from their year-long analysis. Nancy Atkinson talks with the principal investigator of the mission, Tony Colaprete.

Bios: The NLSI brings together leading lunar scientists from around the world to further NASA lunar science and exploration.

Tony Colaprete is the Principal Investigator for the LCROSS mission. He received his Ph.D in Astrophysical, Planetary and Atmospheric Science from the University of Colorado.

Nancy Atkinson is a science journalist and is the Senior Editor for Universe Today.

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Transcript:

***Transcript coming soon.***

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365 Days of Astronomy
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