A demostration of the distant retrograde orbit. /CSU
China on Wednesday successfully conducted its first satellite laser ranging experiment at lunar-distance scales, marking a major technological breakthrough in deep-space exploration.
The breakthrough was announced on Friday by the Technology and Engineering Center for Space Utilization (CSU), Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS), during a mission to explore the Distant Retrograde Orbit (DRO), an orbit known as a natural space harbor.
Using a 1.2-meter-aperture ground-based laser ranging system, scientists precisely measured the distance to the DRO-A satellite at approximately 350,000 kilometers, equivalent to the Earth-moon distance.
The DRO-A satellite, launched back in March 2024, didn't initially reach its orbit, but engineers at CSU managed to guide it to the right position after a 123-day rescue effort.
CSU's DRO mission has established a navigation system that enables auto-piloted satellites in the vast Earth-moon space, which is about 10,000 times larger than the traditional habitat of satellites – the Low Earth Orbit.
This achievement underscores China's growing expertise in space science and its ambitions for future lunar and deep-space missions, according to an announcement on the CAS website. (CGTN)
China is planning to be the first country to land a lunar probe on the far side of the moon, a Chinese lunar probe scientist said Tuesday. The mission will be carried out by Chang'e-4, a backup probe for Chang'e-3, and is slated to be launched before 2020, said Zou Yongliao from the moon exploration department under the Chinese Academy of Sciences at a deep-space exploration forum Tuesday.
Four Chinese volunteers on Friday started a 180-day living experiment in a sealed space capsule, which will test technologies that will support China's deep-space exploration projects. More than a dozen Chinese and overseas institutions are involved in the experiment, including the Shenzhen-based Space Institute of Southern China, the Chinese Academy of Sciences, Harbin Institute of Technology, Harvard University and the German Aerospace Center.
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