Taiwan’s first lunar mission is set to launch late this year. Taiwan's National Central University announced this mission yesterday, revealing that a Deep Space Radiation Probe (DSRP) developed by its faculty and students is scheduled to launch in Japan in the fourth quarter of this year.
The DSRP weighs 400 grams and is slightly larger than the size of a hand. It is designed to study the radiation environment in deep space and its impact on technology from its four-month journey to the moon, providing a reference for future space
missions and the design of space and electronic products. After successful ground tests, demonstrating radiation tolerance, the DSRP was transported to Japan's JAXA Tsukuba Space Center in December last year and will be integrated into the HAKUTO-R Mission 2 lunar lander developed by Ispace, a Japanese private lunar exploration company and partner in this moon-landing mission. Deep space, over 2 thousand kilometers from Earth, presents harsh radiation conditions, impacting both life forms and technological products.