Japan: The Moon lander from Japan has started up again after being offline for a week because of a problem with the power supply.
After fixing the glitch, the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency reported that it had made contact with the lander again on Sunday night.
According to the agency, a change in lighting conditions caused it to receive sunlight again, causing its solar cells to function.
Because the solar cells were pointing away from the sun when it landed on January 20, it was unable to produce any electricity. Japan became just the fifth nation after the US, the former Soviet Union, China, and India to accomplish a soft landing on the moon with the Smart Lander for Investigating Moon (SLIM) spacecraft.
Authorities decided to switch off the spacecraft after it had been operating on battery power for several hours, in order to allow for the possibility of electricity recovery when the angle of sunlight changed.
Jaxa posted a picture of a nearby rock that Slim had taken that it claimed looked like a toy poodle on X. In order to find hints regarding the moon’s formation, the lander will examine the makeup of rocks, according to Jaxa.
SLIM touched down 55 metres (180 feet) from its target at the edge of the Shioli equatorial crater. Jaxa described it as an “unprecedented pinpoint landing.”
Future exploration of the hilly moon poles, which are thought to be potential sources of fuel, water, and oxygen, may be made possible by the landing technology, the agency said.
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