Chinese Yutu-2 Rover is preparing to wake up and continue exploration

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Maybe a big month for China in spatial exploration. The country recently announced that it had been successfully landed at the surface of March. China also announced that its Rover Yutu-2 is preparing to wake up and continue exploring the other side of the moon. Yutu-2 is on the other side of the moon since January 2019 and has completed 29 lunar days of activity as of April 23, 2021.

China has put the lander in a state sleeping on April 19, right outside the sunset. Yutu-2 is powered by solar energy and the sleeping state had to help protect the rover from temperatures as low as -290 degrees Fahrenheit. The Rover and Lander will wake up on their hibernation this month after the sun rises on the Rover and Lander on their landing site in the Von Kármán crater.

Yutu-2 has traveled the Northwest since its landing point and has traveled 2325 feet from landing, data collection along the way. The Rover has panoramic cameras, a lunar penetrating radar and a visible and near-infrared imaging spectrometer. The rover has six wheels and weighs 310 pounds and has already discovered several distinct layers of rock below the lunar surface.

Scientists believe that rock layers are created by volcanism and asteroid strikes. The Rover has also observed materials delivered from nearby craters, such as FINSEN crater. China believes that its Rover could be essential to determine the history of the evolution of the surface on the moon and draw the source of surface materials discovered by the rover.

Chinese scientists have chosen the landing location for Yutu-2 because they think the event that created the basin could have flouted the rock of the moon crust, and that this material could help reveal mysteries on the moon.