I mean, the opportunity cost of not being able to use part of the frequency spectrum is also pretty big. And some of the structural elements are there to stand up to terrestrial conditions, like precipitation, wind, and much-stronger gravity. They wouldn’t need those on the Moon.
I think a more-fundamental issue is that it imposes constraints on the direction in which one can be pulling data from. No great fix for that.
EDIT: If this NASA project makes it to deployment, then there will be at least one up there.
If completed, the telescope would have a structural diameter of 1.3 km, and the reflector would be 350m in diameter.[3][4][5] Robotic lift wires and an anchoring system would enable origami deployment of the parabolic reflector.[6]
Both “on the earth” and “on the moon” provide about the viewing angle of the sky (a semi-sphere). Unless we’re tracking an object with multiple of these spaced around the earth to get 24/7 recordings the moon doesn’t seem worse…
Even then, with two of these you could put them opposite eachother just barely into the “dark side” (side facing away from earth) of the moon and get nearly 360 degree coverage. You’d have to not literally be on the boundary/leave an earth sized gap in the coverage, but it would be pretty damn close.
Yeah, that’s a good point. Though I suppose that some satellites will push at the edge of that, and the further one gets from the Earth antipode on the Moon, the more one will run into that.
googles
Looks like some go out beyond the Moon, like TESS:
Satellites go beyond the moon, but not starlink satellites (or any future competing large mesh network of satellites), they are in in low orbit to minimize latency. I haven’t double checked with math or anything but I don’t think they should be high enough to be in sight of much more of the moon than the earth is.
Don’t overlook the changes required for electronics that are able to operate in space. Since there’d be no atmospheric sheilding from radiation, the amount of additional silicon for error correction used per unit of compute is much higher. The capacity for cooling is also much lower on the moon, you’d essentially have to slap huge heatsinks on every component since you basically rely on radiation for heat dissipation. You’ll also constantly be fighting with the fact that every electrically conductive trace serves as an antenna, so the trace length vs component density for heat dissipation is going to be a constant battle. Then there is the limited availability of power.
It all adds up to an entirely different class of device being able to be deployed in space. On earth we can just chuck high precision components around, throw swathes of power and cooling at it and call it a day. Rain and weather are a footnote compared to the design challenges space deployments represent.
I mean, the opportunity cost of not being able to use part of the frequency spectrum is also pretty big. And some of the structural elements are there to stand up to terrestrial conditions, like precipitation, wind, and much-stronger gravity. They wouldn’t need those on the Moon.
I think a more-fundamental issue is that it imposes constraints on the direction in which one can be pulling data from. No great fix for that.
EDIT: If this NASA project makes it to deployment, then there will be at least one up there.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lunar_Crater_Radio_Telescope
Both “on the earth” and “on the moon” provide about the viewing angle of the sky (a semi-sphere). Unless we’re tracking an object with multiple of these spaced around the earth to get 24/7 recordings the moon doesn’t seem worse…
Even then, with two of these you could put them opposite eachother just barely into the “dark side” (side facing away from earth) of the moon and get nearly 360 degree coverage. You’d have to not literally be on the boundary/leave an earth sized gap in the coverage, but it would be pretty damn close.
Yeah, that’s a good point. Though I suppose that some satellites will push at the edge of that, and the further one gets from the Earth antipode on the Moon, the more one will run into that.
googles
Looks like some go out beyond the Moon, like TESS:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transiting_Exoplanet_Survey_Satellite
Satellites go beyond the moon, but not starlink satellites (or any future competing large mesh network of satellites), they are in in low orbit to minimize latency. I haven’t double checked with math or anything but I don’t think they should be high enough to be in sight of much more of the moon than the earth is.
Don’t overlook the changes required for electronics that are able to operate in space. Since there’d be no atmospheric sheilding from radiation, the amount of additional silicon for error correction used per unit of compute is much higher. The capacity for cooling is also much lower on the moon, you’d essentially have to slap huge heatsinks on every component since you basically rely on radiation for heat dissipation. You’ll also constantly be fighting with the fact that every electrically conductive trace serves as an antenna, so the trace length vs component density for heat dissipation is going to be a constant battle. Then there is the limited availability of power.
It all adds up to an entirely different class of device being able to be deployed in space. On earth we can just chuck high precision components around, throw swathes of power and cooling at it and call it a day. Rain and weather are a footnote compared to the design challenges space deployments represent.