Lunar Exploration Roadmap

Abstract

Aerospace contributes to fundamental human questions for more than 60 years. After focusing on research in the first decades, first institutional and commercial services were provided for communication (since 1960s), weather forecast (since 1970s) and navigation (since 1990s). Currently, space exploration undergoes a dramatic change mostly due to "New Space" economy opening novel business models, e.g. in Earth observation, communication/ navigation, launchers, ground stations, even in manned space flights. This development is unthinkable without decades of government-funded research. The research communities need to accompany this transition process, to take advantage of new opportunities, to support the development of space technologies and services and also to re-define their roles in the field of aerospace. Subjects as space science and planetary exploration, protection from space threats and resource utilization will stay non-commercial for the next decades. DLR, the largest space agency in Europe, needs to answer these challenges. From the authors' point of view it is important to bundle R & D activities to develop and offer powerful contributions to international space missions. For doing so, the extraordinary experience of several DLR institutes shall be used as a nucleus. Following several international space exploration strategies and considering own capabilities and experiences, the authors propose to focus on the field of robotic exploration of the Moon as a strategic goal of the DLR space research. Starting with this motivation and with a chapter describing DLR's heritage on robotic exploration missions, this paper lists scientific research questions and mission scenarios. The subsequent chapters describe the robotic, sensors and communication technologies needed for moon missions. The paper concludes with an analysis of the research environment and first draft ideas for a technological roadmap. The explicit goal of the authors is to contribute to a DLR-led robotic exploration mission in 2035.