Significance and preliminary proposal for exploring the lunar lava tubes
Abstract
<p indent="0mm">Recognizing and exploiting the moon are two major targets for human beings. To construct the lunar base is vitally important for reaching above goals. Lunar base site selection firstly requires consideration of lunar environment and resources. Among possible options, lunar lava tube caves have a variety of advantages, e.g. mild and feasible environment and potential resource support, and should be listed as a top priority for lunar base site selection. On the bases of summarizing the latest detection results and the previous research, this paper analyzes the lunar lava tube cave from the following aspects: their distribution, external geological features, internal environments and available resources. We propose a preliminary exploration plan and corresponding payloads, and suggest that more detailed study and mission planning are required. In addition, three candidates of lunar lava tube caves have been proposed for future scientific exploration and lunar base construction. </p>
