CAS-1 lunar soil simulant

Abstract

Lunar soil simulant is a geochemical reproduction of lunar regolith, and is needed for lunar science and engineering researches. This paper describes a new lunar soil simulant, CAS-1, prepared by the Chinese Academy of Sciences, to support lunar orbiter, soft-landing mission and sample return missions of China’s Lunar Exploration Program, which is scheduled for 2004–2020. Such simulants should match the samples returned from the Moon, all collected from the lunar regolith rather than outcrops. The average mineral and chemical composition of lunar soil sample returned from the Apollo 14 mission, which landed on the Fra Mauro Formation, is chosen as the model for the CAS-1 simulant. Source material for this simulant was a low-Ti basaltic scoria dated at 1600 years from the late Quaternary volcanic area in the Changbai Mountains of northeast China. The main minerals of this rock are pyroxene, olivine, and minor plagioclase, and about 20–40% modal glass. The scoria was analyzed by XRF and found to be chemically similar to Apollo 14 lunar sample 14163. It was crushed in an impact mill with a resulting median particle size 85.9 μm, similar to Apollo soils. Bulk density, shear resistance, complex permittivity, and reflectance spectra were also similar to Apollo 14 soil. We conclude that CAS-1 is an ideal lunar soil simulant for science and engineering research of future lunar exploration program.