National Space Commission Approves India's Fifth Lunar Mission 'Lupex'

That is after the success of Chandrayaan-3. The National Space Commission has cleared the fifth lunar mission -- the Lunar Polar Exploration Mission or Lupex. Lupex will further explore the Moon for water and other resources. This is a collaborative mission by the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) and Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA).

The mission is also a part of a wider lunar roadmap for India, whose vision was to send a person to the Moon and bring him or her back safely.

Critically, Lupex may reportedly sustain for up to 100 days on the lunar surface--well over five times the lifespans of Chandrayaan-3.

The Lupex rover and rocket will be developed in JAXA, while ISRO will develop the lander system. The Lupex rover can weigh a massive 350 kg and will weigh much more than Chandrayaan-3's Pragyan rover, which weighed 26 kg.

The mission will send the rover to land exactly at the lunar south pole (90-degree latitude) to probe for water and other valuable resources present on the Moon.

The Indo-Japanese mission will also quantify the amount of water present on the surface and the amount below it. Lupex will also measure how much dry regolith-a layer of loose rock and dust covering the bedrock on the Moon-is mixed with water.

The Lupex mission would be exploring permanently shadowed regions or the dark side of the moon and gaining experience about its surface by drilling and in-situ experiments. This would enable easier missions for sampling later, followed by human landing on the surface of the moon in 2040.

India and Japan have done tremendous work over the years in terms of sending spacecraft to the Moon.

Recently, in August 2023, Chandrayaan-3 near-south pole lander made India the fourth country to make a successful Moon landing, followed by Japan's success with the Smart Lander for Investigating Moon, SLIM in January 2024, making Japan the fifth country to land on the Moon.