If Science Channel and Discovery Channel have their way, live broadcast of the bland surface of the moon from 2015 will be seen on the Earth, thanks to the Google Lunar Xprize money of $30 million.
The networks would follow teams as they try to land a craft on the surface of the moon, travel 500 metres and transmit live pictures and video back to earth.
“More than half of the world’s population has never had the opportunity to view a live transmission from the lunar surface,” the organisers were quoted as saying.
The Google Lunar Xprize aims to create a new “Apollo” moment for this generation and to spur continuous lunar exploration with $40 Million in incentive based prizes.
The Science Channel and Discovery Channel would follow the entire process including testing, lift-off and live coverage of the winning lunar landing, which is estimated to take place in 2015.
“In addition to the technological breakthroughs catalysed by the Google Lunar Xprize, we have an equally important goal of inspiring young scientists, engineers and space explorers,” Robert Weiss of Xprize was quoted as saying in media reports.
How old is Moon?
Meanwhile, scientists have found the Moon, Earth’s natural satellite is about 4.5 billion years old and was formed about 100 million years after the solar system was born.
Based on computer simulation with data on the mass of material added to the Earth by accretion after the formation of the Moon revealed a relationship that works much like a “geologic clock” in solar system history that does not rely on the radioactive decay of atomic nuclei to determine age.
“We were excited to find a ‘clock’ for the formation time of the Moon that didn’t rely on radiometric dating methods. This correlation just jumped out of the simulations and held in each set of old simulations we looked at,” said lead author Seth Jacobson from the Observatory de la Cote d’Azur, France.