Lunar rover
Other rovers have been partially or fully autonomous robots, such as the Soviet Union's Lunokhods, Chinese Yutus, Indian Pragyan, and Japan's LEVs.
Five countries have had operating rovers on the Moon: the Soviet Union, the United States, China, India, and Japan.
Lunokhod and the Chinese Yutu rovers were furthermore equipped with a radioisotope heater unit to keep instruments warm.
Radioisotope thermoelectric generators can operate independent of the day/night cycle and have been used on missions to other celestial bodies in the past.
The objectives of the mission were to collect images of the lunar surface, examine ambient light levels to determine the feasibility of astronomical observations from the Moon, perform laser ranging experiments, observe solar X-rays, measure local magnetic fields, and study the soil mechanics of the lunar surface material.
[4] The lunar rover is called Yutu, or Jade Rabbit, a name selected in an online poll.
Chandrayaan-3 was launched on 14 July 2023 by the Indian Space Research Organisation in India's second attempt to soft land a rover and a lander on the Moon.
[13][14] Rashid was a lunar rover built by MBRSC to be launched onboard Ispace's lander called Hakuto-R.
[17] Sora-Q was developed by Takara Tomy, JAXA and Doshisha University to be launched onboard Ispace's lander called Hakuto-R Mission 1.
[22] The Chang'e 4 Chinese mission launched on 7 December 2018, and landed and deployed the Yutu-2 rover on the far side of the Moon on 3 January 2019.
[24] In February 2020, Chinese astronomers reported, for the first time, a high-resolution image of a lunar ejecta sequence, and, as well, direct analysis of its internal architecture.
These were based on observations made by the Lunar Penetrating Radar (LPR) on board the Yutu-2 rover while studying the far side of the Moon.
[25][26] Data from its two-channel ground penetrating radar (GPR) has been used by scientists to put together an image of multiple layers beneath the surface of the far side of the Moon up to a depth of 300 meters.
[28] The Hakuto-R Mission 2 includes a 5 kg (11 lb) rover called "TENACIOUS", designed and manufactured in Luxembourg which will explore the area around the landing site, after being lowered to the lunar surface from the lander.
[30] The All-Terrain Hex-Legged Extra-Terrestrial Explorer (ATHLETE) is a six-legged robotic lunar rover test-bed under development by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL).
[33][34] Resource Prospector is a cancelled mission concept by NASA of a rover that would have performed a survey expedition on a polar region of the Moon.
The rover was to attempt to detect and map the location of volatiles such as hydrogen, oxygen and lunar water which could foster more affordable and sustainable human exploration to the Moon, Mars, and other Solar System bodies.
