LRO's First Moon Images [NASA]
NASAの月探査機LROの観測カメラによる初画像が公開されてます。狭角カメラは幅およそ3.5kmで73cm/pixel、3mほどの物体が識別できる画像が得られたとか書いてありますね。広角カメラの画像は幅およそ90km、105m/pixelだそうです。
■First LROC Images! [LROC]
What is summed mode? Along the terminator, there simply is not much light – the instrument is “photon-starved,” resulting in suboptimal signal-to-noise ratios. Or, to put it another way, without summing, images taken in this circumstance would be underexposed. To compensate for low light levels, we can effectively make the pixels larger by summing adjacent pixels to increase the signal-to-noise ratio, making the image sharper, though with 2x lower resolution.
The best is yet to come! Once LRO finishes commissioning operations and enters its 50-km x 50-km mapping orbit, a maneuver currently scheduled for mid-August, the LROC NAC will take images over 8% of the Moon at 50-cm/pixel.
8月中旬に高度50kmの観測軌道に入り、解像度50cmの狭角カメラで月面の8％以上を観測すると書いてありますね。これはやはり主に南極とか北極あたりの月面基地候補地を高解像度で観測して、広角カメラの方で全球マッピングとかするんでしょうね。
