BENGALURU: Senior space scientists from Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO), Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) and Mitsubishi Heavy Industries (MHI) have conducted a two-day technical interface meeting on the joint Indo-Japanese Chandrayaan-5/Lunar Polar Exploration (LUPEX)) mission.
The mission, the date for which is yet to be decided, will be the fifth mission in the Chandrayaan series of lunar missions, in collaboration with JAXA, to study the lunar volatile materials, including lunar water, in the vicinity of a Permanently Shadowed Region (PSR) at the lunar South pole. Chandrayaa-5 will follow Chandrayaan-4, which ISRO is looking to launch sometime in 2027 to be India’s first lunar sample return mission.
Chandrayaan-5 will be launched by JAXA onboard its H3-24L launch vehicle, carrying the ISRO-made lunar lander. ISRO’s lunar lander will be carrying the lunar rover made by Japan’s Mitsubishi Heavy Industries (MHI). ISRO will also be responsible for developing a few scientific instruments for the mission, details of which are yet to be confirmed. The scientific instruments for this mission would be contributed by ISRO, JAXA, European Space Agency and NASA, all thematically connected with the exploration and on-site analyses of volatiles reserved in the lunar polar region.
The two-day face-to-face meeting, which was held over May 13 and 14 at ISRO Headquarters in Bengaluru, deliberated on various technical interfaces, joint mission implementation plan, as well as potential landing sites for the Chandrayaan-5 lunar mission.
Dr Tirtha Pratim Das, Director, Science Programme Office, ISRO Headquarters, spoke on the landing site selection, payload optimisation, mission design and ground segment and communication. G Ravi Chandra Babu, study team leader of Chandrayaan-5/LUPEX, emphasised on the need for the clear definition of the milestones, timeline and deliverables of the project.
Dai-Asoh, Project Manager, LUPEX Project Team, JAXA, briefed the meeting about technical progress made towards the development of the rover and the interfaces related. M Ganesh Pillai, Scientific Secretary, ISRO, emphasized the importance of the collaborative endeavour for the scientific and technical aspects of the mission.
The Chandrayaan-5/LUPEX mission, approved by the Centre on March 10, 2025, will be one of the major short-term milestones in India’s lunar exploration odyssey, which envisions Indian Gaganyatris (astronauts) landing on the Moon by 2040.