A look inside the moon’s secret places

Until now, the moon’s darkest craters that never see sunlight remained shrouded in mystery for scientists. The ASU designed and led ShadowCam, a powerful science camera that is 200 times more sensitive to light than previous lunar cameras, has now lit up a crater’s pockets hidden in permanent darkness.

As part of a collaboration between NASA and the Korea Aerospace Research Institute, ShadowCam was mounted on the Korean spacecraft Danuri and gave scientists their first detailed glimpse of permanently shadowed regions of the moon. The images are helping NASA plan future surface exploration targets before astronauts are scheduled to touch down nearby during the Artemis III mission in 2025.

Some scientists think there may be deposits of water, or even methane and ammonia, in these mysterious craters. If so, these materials would potentially be useful for future human presence on the moon and may also provide important clues to the past billion years of our solar system.