Japan's moon probe SLIM back to sleep: JAXA

Japan's lunar probe has once again fallen into a dormant state after surviving the lunar night, the country's space agency said.

The Smart Lander for Investigating Moon (SLIM), the touchdown of which made Japan the world's fifth lunar landing country, entered a period of dormancy following its descent into the shadow of the Shioli crater after 3 a.m. (1800 GMT) on Friday, according to the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA).

Despite harsh temperature cycles that increase the risk of malfunction, SLIM is scheduled to resume operations during the next sunlight exposure in late March, the JAXA said on X, formerly known as Twitter, on Friday.

According to the JAXA, SLIM awaited improved temperature conditions while acquiring valuable data on the lunar surface and post-night exploration from last Sunday night, but it faced challenges during its attempt at scientific observation using the Multi-band Spectral Camera (MBC).

"Although the MBC successfully activated, it failed to operate as expected, likely due to the effects of overnight exposure," said the agency.

On Monday, the JAXA announced that its communication with SLIM, which had been dormant for nearly a month, was reestablished.

It was believed that the probe made it through the lunar night by enduring freezing temperatures of around minus 170 degrees Celsius and restarted power generation as sunlight illuminated its solar panels.

SLIM, dubbed the "moon sniper," landed on the moon on January 20 and was later confirmed to have achieved a pinpoint landing with an unprecedented precision of less than 100 meters from intended targets, as opposed to conventional landers that often have an accuracy of within several kilometers.

As its solar cells were not generating electricity, the lander, some 2.4 meters tall and weighing about 200 kilograms excluding fuel, was switched off on January 22 after working on backup batteries. It restored power and started functioning on January 29, then fell into dormancy on February 1.