First measurements of the radiation dose on the lunar surface

Shenyi Zhang; Robert F Wimmer-Schweingruber; Jia Yu; Chi Wang; Qiang Fu; Yongliao Zou; Yueqiang Sun; Chunqin Wang; Donghui Hou; Stephan I Böttcher; Sönke Burmeister; Lars Seimetz; Björn Schuster; Violetta Knierim; Guohong Shen; Bin Yuan; Henning Lohf; Jingnan Guo; Zigong Xu; Johan L Freiherr von Forstner; Shrinivasrao R Kulkarni; Haitao Xu; Changbin Xue; Jun Li; Zhe Zhang; He Zhang; Thomas Berger; Daniel Matthiä; Christine E Hellweg; Xufeng Hou; Jinbin Cao; Zhen Chang; Binquan Zhang; Yuesong Chen; Hao Geng; Zida Quan

doi:10.1126/sciadv.aaz1334

First measurements of the radiation dose on the lunar surface

Sci Adv. 2020 Sep 25;6(39):eaaz1334. doi: 10.1126/sciadv.aaz1334. Print 2020 Sep.

Authors

Shenyi Zhang^{1

2

3

4}, Robert F Wimmer-Schweingruber^{5

6}, Jia Yu⁶, Chi Wang¹, Qiang Fu^{7

8}, Yongliao Zou¹, Yueqiang Sun^{1

2

4}, Chunqin Wang^{1

2

4}, Donghui Hou^{1

2

3

4}, Stephan I Böttcher⁶, Sönke Burmeister⁶, Lars Seimetz⁶, Björn Schuster⁶, Violetta Knierim⁶, Guohong Shen^{1

2

4}, Bin Yuan^{1

2

4}, Henning Lohf⁶, Jingnan Guo^{6

9

10}, Zigong Xu⁶, Johan L Freiherr von Forstner⁶, Shrinivasrao R Kulkarni⁶, Haitao Xu¹, Changbin Xue¹, Jun Li¹, Zhe Zhang¹¹, He Zhang¹², Thomas Berger¹³, Daniel Matthiä¹³, Christine E Hellweg¹³, Xufeng Hou¹⁴, Jinbin Cao¹⁵, Zhen Chang^{1

2

4}, Binquan Zhang^{1

2

4}, Yuesong Chen¹, Hao Geng¹, Zida Quan^{1

2

4}

Affiliations

¹ National Space Science Center, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, PR China.
² Beijing Key Laboratory of Space Environment Exploration, Beijing, PR China.
³ University of Chinese Academy of Science, Beijing, PR China.
⁴ Key Laboratory of Environmental Space Situation Awareness Technology, Beijing, PR China.
⁵ National Space Science Center, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, PR China. wimmer@physik.uni-kiel.de.
⁶ Institute of Experimental and Applied Physics, Christian-Albrechts-University, Kiel, Germany.
⁷ National Astronomical Observatories, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, PR China.
⁸ Key Laboratory of Lunar and Deep Space Exploration, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, PR China.
⁹ University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, PR China.
¹⁰ CAS Center for Excellence in Comparative Planetology, Hefei, PR China.
¹¹ Lunar Exploration and Space Engineering Center, Beijing, PR China.
¹² China Academy of Space Technology, Beijing, PR China.
¹³ German Aerospace Center (DLR), Institute of Aerospace Medicine, Cologne, Germany.
¹⁴ 18th Research Institute, China Electronics Technology Group Corporation, Tianjin, PR China.
¹⁵ BeiHang University, Beijing, PR China.

Abstract

Human exploration of the Moon is associated with substantial risks to astronauts from space radiation. On the surface of the Moon, this consists of the chronic exposure to galactic cosmic rays and sporadic solar particle events. The interaction of this radiation field with the lunar soil leads to a third component that consists of neutral particles, i.e., neutrons and gamma radiation. The Lunar Lander Neutrons and Dosimetry experiment aboard China's Chang'E 4 lander has made the first ever measurements of the radiation exposure to both charged and neutral particles on the lunar surface. We measured an average total absorbed dose rate in silicon of 13.2 ± 1 μGy/hour and a neutral particle dose rate of 3.1 ± 0.5 μGy/hour.

Copyright © 2020 The Authors, some rights reserved; exclusive licensee American Association for the Advancement of Science. No claim to original U.S. Government Works. Distributed under a Creative Commons Attribution NonCommercial License 4.0 (CC BY-NC).