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Is It Time For Lunar Farside Telescopes?
Recent efforts to return to the Moon, and speculation about what these missions might accomplish, raise an interesting question. What about astronomical observatories?
The lunar far side is permanently shielded from the radio signals generated by humans on Earth. During the lunar night, it is also protected from the Sun. These characteristics makes it probably the most “radio-quiet” location in the whole solar system as no other planet or moon has a side that permanently faces away from the Earth. It is therefore ideally suited for radio astronomy...
But there is also a tension here: human activities on the lunar far side may create unwanted radio interference, and plans to extract water-ice from shadowed craters might make it difficult for those same craters to be used for astronomy. As my colleagues and I recently argued, we will need to ensure that lunar locations that are uniquely valuable for astronomy are protected in this new age of lunar exploration.
(Via DevDiscourse.)
An early reference to the idea of a lunar observatory can be found in We Have Fed Our Sea, a 1958 story by Poul Anderson:
Several types of astronomy would benefit. The most obvious is radio astronomy, which can be conducted from the side of the Moon that always faces away from Earth – the far side.
Maclaren nodded. "Mount Ambarzumian Observatory, on Farside. Still a little dust and gas to bother us, of course, but I'll let the purists go out to Pluto Satellite and bring me back their plates.”
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