science

Manfred Memorial Moon Mission

Manfred Memorial Moon Mission is a science topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand Manfred Memorial Moon Mission rather than just read about it. In short: Manfred Memorial Moon Mission (4M) was the first private lunar probe to successfully fly by the Moon. It was led by LuxSpace, a child company of German OHB System, and named in honor of OHB Systems founder, Manfred Fuchs, who died in 2014.

Key takeaways

Manfred Memorial Moon Mission belongs to science; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect Manfred Memorial Moon Mission to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of Manfred Memorial Moon Mission from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

Manfred Memorial Moon Mission (4M) was the first private lunar probe to successfully fly by the Moon. It was led by LuxSpace, a child company of German OHB System, and named in honor of OHB Systems founder, Manfred Fuchs, who died in 2014. It was launched with the Chinese Chang'e 5-T1 test spacecraft on 23 October 2014. The lunar flyby took place on 28 October 2014, after which the spacecraft entered elliptical Earth orbit and continued transmission until 11 November 2014, exceeding its designed lifetime by four times. The spacecraft, along with the rocket stage to which it was attached, likely made impact with the surface of the Moon after its orbit decayed, on 4 March 2022. This made Luxembourg the eighth country to reach the surface of the Moon.

Spacecraft

The briefcase-sized probe, with a mass of 14 kg was built by the Luxemburg company LuxSpace. Its primary power source consisted of 28 non-rechargeable Saft LSH20 HTS lithium cells, which provided 4.5 W power for the payload electronics. It was permanently attached to the Long March 3C/G2 upper stage through the mission, and its design was adapted to function near the electromagnetic interference from the rocket's 1 kW S band transmitter. The secondary power source included 4 Saft MPS lithium-ion batteries recharged by a 2x8 grid of solar panels, to recharge its batteries. Unlike the primary power source, however, it was dependent on the spacecraft attitude (orientation) and rotation rate, determining the availability of sunlight to recharge the batteries. The onboard computer was an FM430.

Payload Amateur radio The radio payload consisted of a quarter-wave monopole antenna supported by an I/Q modulator, and an RF power amplifier providing 1.5 W power. The probe's antenna transmitted up to 2,500, 13-character digital messages at 145.980 MHz using digital mode JT65B, with additional tone transmissions. LuxSpace created a contest with prizes for amateur radio operators to receive these transmissions and send results back to the company. The radio was activated 77.8 minutes after the launch, and the first radio signal was received in Brazil at 19:18 UTC. The team expected 10 participants to join the contest, but more than 60 people took part. Scoring was based on the number of messages received.

Dosimeter The 4M probe featured a small dosimeter that measured ionizing radiation in space. The instrument was provided by the Spanish company iC-Málaga. The instrument measured the total ionizing dose every 5 minutes, and it showed a significant increase in radiation doses while crossing Van Allen radiation belts. 215 hours into the mission, the radiation sensor stopped working for unknown reasons.

Mission The probe was permanently attached to the third stage of Long March 3C/G2 on 23 October 2014 at 18:00 UTC along with Chang'e 5-T1, making its closest flyby a day after Chang'e 5-T1. The lunar flyby took place during the night of 28 October 2014. After that, the probe entered a highly elliptical geocentric orbit with a period of 14 days and it remains in space. The last transmission from the spacecraft was received on 11 November 2014, 01:35 UTC. It is expected that the booster, along with 4M, should have impacted the Moon on March 4, 2022, near the Hertzsprung crater. A campaign to reacquire radio contact with the probe, knowing it could theoretically be reactivated depending on the orientation of the solar panels, was performed both by radioastronomers and amateurs, but without success.

Honorifics The 4M probe was the first private lunar probe to successfully perform a lunar flyby. A similar flyby on 13 May 1998 by the PAS-22 satellite, at the time called HGS-1, a geostationary communications satellite made a lunar flyby in a recovery attempt after a partially failed launch that left it on an unusable highly elliptical orbit. Using gravity assist manoeuvres, the satellite was successfully recovered on 17 June. Unlike the 4M mission, the HGS-1 was not designed as a lunar mission, and made a flyby only in a recovery attempt, however according to Hughes Global Services, the satellite operator at the time, it claimed the title of the first commercial mission to the Moon. The first commercial payload to the surface of the Moon was by Celestis, that paid for commercial transportation of a human remains memorial on board the Lunar Prospector, which impacted the Moon's surface on 31 July 1999.

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with Manfred Memorial Moon Mission

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what Manfred Memorial Moon Mission claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In science, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to Manfred Memorial Moon Mission before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about Manfred Memorial Moon Mission ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of Manfred Memorial Moon Mission

In research: Manfred Memorial Moon Mission appears in science research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses Manfred Memorial Moon Mission in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: Manfred Memorial Moon Mission is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics 2022 on the Moon, Missions to the Moon, Private spaceflight, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for Manfred Memorial Moon Mission outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study Manfred Memorial Moon Mission in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what Manfred Memorial Moon Mission means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain Manfred Memorial Moon Mission out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is Manfred Memorial Moon Mission in simple terms?

Why does Manfred Memorial Moon Mission matter?

Because it connects several science ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study Manfred Memorial Moon Mission?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on Manfred Memorial Moon Mission.