If everything goes to plan, Chandrayaan-3 will make India the first country to explore the uncharted south pole of the Moon.
Two major components of this project are the Propulsion Module (PM) and Lander Module (LM). The PM as the name suggests takes the LM to its intended lunar orbit, and will take metric measurements of Earth from lunar orbit.
The LM, Vikram, named after Vikram Sarabhai, the Indian physicist regarded as the father of the Indian space programme, which carries the rover Pragyan on board, will detach from the PM and descend to the lunar surface.
Once the soft landing is complete, Vikram will lower a ramp to enable Pragyan's insertion on the surface of the Moon.
Vikram has a mission life of one lunar day, equivalent to 14 Earth days. It has a mass of 1749.86 kg including Pragyan. Its payload includes the Radio Anatomy of Moon Bound Hypersensitive Ionosphere and Atmosphere (RAMBHA) instrument, which will be used to measure the density of ions and electrons on the satellite.
Besides that is Chandra's Surface Thermo Physical Experiment (ChaSTE) for thermal readings, and an Instrument for Lunar Seismic Activity (ILSA).
Vikram also carries NASA's Laser Retroreflector Array (LRA), which is an experiment to understand the Moon's dynamics. The LRA will also be responsible for hazard detection and avoidance during landing.
The final payload is the Alpha Particle X-ray Spectrometer (APXS) which will be used to determine the elemental composition of the soil and rocks around the landing site.
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