NASA's second moon probe reaches lunar orbit

"By the CNN Wire Staff

updated 6:40 PM EST, Sun January 1, 2012

(CNN) -- The second of two new research probes successfully entered the moon's orbit Sunday afternoon, a day after its companion, NASA announced.

The unmanned Gravity Recovery and Interior Laboratory-B (GRAIL-B) fired its main engines at 5:05 p.m. and slipped into lunar orbit 39 minutes later, controllers at the space agency's Jet Propulsion Laboratory reported. Its companion GRAIL-A probe arrived on Saturday.

"Cheers in JPL mission control as everything is looking good for #GRAIL-B," the Pasadena, California, laboratory announced on its Twitter page. "It's going to be a great 2012!"

Here's the whole article:

http://www.cnn.com/2012/01/01/us/us-moon-probe/index.html?hpt=hp_t3

Additional information from wikipedia:



"Primary objectives:

Map the structure of the lunar crust and lithosphere
Understand the asymmetric thermal evolution of the Moon
Determine the subsurface structure of impact basins and the origin of lunar mascons
Ascertain the temporal evolution of crustal brecciation and magmatism
Constrain the deep interior structure of the Moon
Place limits on the size of the Moon's inner core..."

If you would like more information regarding the Grail A and B program, here is the link to the Wikipedia article:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gravity_Recovery_and_Interior_Laboratory

Interesting........I noticed the mission graphic has no vector symbol.......And, the colorization of the moon image is curious...And although it isn't clear, it would seem the visual aspect, imaging of the moon, will not result in significantly higher resolution of the surface...........

Really too bad there isn't images produced on film like the old days. The original negatives would certainly be worth looking at with today's superior optics...........And create less of a potential "fudge" factor in the "displayed" image.....

Looking forward to the updates!!!

Thanks again Jackie!!!