One major environmental constraint during exploration missions is the presence of charged dust-like particles. Therefore, it is of utmost importance to characterise the properties of the dust particles present on the exploration sites and their transportation mechanisms to enable efficient mitigation techniques to be put in place. The main objective of the DUSTER (Dust Study, Transport, and...
The Moon's surface regolith has endured billions of years of space weathering, including solar wind and UV/cosmic ray bombardment, resulting in a highly charged surface. Some of this charging is permanent due to the embedded solar wind ions in the crystal structures of the Moon's exposed surface minerals. Given the low gravity environment, the inability to discharge due to dry and vacuum...
The key to dealing with dust contamination lies in understanding its adhesive behaviour. It is currently unclear which of several adhesion forces (namely electrostatic and van der Waals forces) would dominate for the different particle sizes present on the Moon. The complex radiative environment under ultra-high vacuum as well as the high variation in shape, composition, and size of the...
It is well known from the apollo era that lunar dust is a great challenge for lunar surface operations and must be addressed to achieve sustained human presence on the moon. Lunar Dust can cause many potential problems for surface missions and space equipment so minimising dust contamination, understanding the potential effects, and having effective dust mitigation techniques are essential for...
Planetary dust particles are a severe threat to different sensitive surfaces of landers and rovers. The success of future missions requires tools for modelling such environments. Technical challenges are linked to accurately model major factors influencing the contamination transport: reconstruction of the plume flow field, regolith erosion, electrostatics, and particle-surface...
