LRO Science Payload

LRO Science Payload

LRO's science payload includes seven instruments designed to gather data facilitating human exploration of the moon:

Artist's illustration of the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter.

Artist's illustration of the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter.
Illustration by Chris Meaney/NASA.

  1. CRaTER: The Cosmic Ray Telescope for the Effects of Radiation, CRaTER, will characterize the lunar radiation environment and its biological impacts.
     
  2. DIVINER: The Diviner Lunar Radiometer Experiment (DLRE) will measure lunar surface temperature, providing information essential for future explorations.
     
  3. LAMP: The Lyman-Alpha Mapping Project will provide images of permanently shadowed areas, in search of surface ice.
     
  4. LEND: The Lunar Exploration Neutron Detector will measure neutron flux and create maps of surface and subsurface hydrogen distribution. It can detect hydrogen in shadowed craters near the lunar poles that may be water ice.
     
  5. LOLA: The Lunar Orbiter Laser Altimeter will provide a global lunar topographic model and geodetic grid, useful for targeting landing and exploratory locations.
     
  6. LROC: The Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter Camera experiment is actually comprised of a pair of a narrow-angle cameras and a wide-angle camera. It will assess meter-scale features and will acquire images of the poles during each orbit in order to characterize the illumination environment.
     
  7. Mini-RF: The Miniature Radio Frequency will use radar illumination of the surface to provide observations of permanently shadowed areas. It will determine if ice is present in significant amounts in those shadowed areas.