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J.L. Josset (CSEM Micro-camera \& Planetary Exploration)
The Asteroid Moon micro-Imager Experiment (AMIE) is an imaging system selected for the ESA moon mission SMART-1. AMIE is derived from the development efforts already under way for the Technological Research Program of ESA, the ROSETTA and MARS missions.
Synthetic Objectives of AMIE during the SMART-1 mission:
- Imaging Lunar South Pole (Aitken basin) Permanent shadow (ice deposit) Eternal light (crater rims) - Mapping of high latitudes regions (south) mainly at far side
The present baseline plan considers an orbit with an apocenter of 10000 km and a pericenter of 300 km to 1800 km. At a distance of 300 km, the field of view of AMIE (5.3° x 5.3°) corresponds to 27 km. The pixel size for the 1024 x 1024 CCD is therefore 27 m at pericenter. The South polar region had been proposed as the focus of European lunar activities by the Lunar Science Advisory Group of ESA on the following grounds: 1. The possibility of ice deposits was already considered in 1995. This has now been confirmed by the results of the Lunar Prospector neutron spectrometer, although contrarily to the expectations from Clementine the reservoir may be larger at the North pole. 2. The South pole is on the rim of a major geologic feature discovered by Clementine, the Aitken (our South polar) basin, more than 1500 km in diameter, the largest such feature on the Moon. It penetrated very deep into the farside crust, as witnessed by the contamination by mantle material, but was not filled up by lava flows as was the case for similar features on the near side. There is therefore a strong interest in investigating at close range the mineralogical composition of ejecta which provide a vertical sounding of the farside crust down to several ten km. AMIE will directly contribute to the characterisation of surface mineralogy and geology, in combination with other elements of the payload.