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Japan's commercial space venture, Ispace, is on the brink of making history with its lunar lander, Resilience, which is scheduled to attempt a touchdown on the moon at 3:24 p.m. ET this Thursday. This mission comes nearly three months after its companion spacecraft, Firefly Aerospace’s Blue Ghost, made a successful landing on the lunar surface.

Resilience's journey to the moon has been a meticulous and gradual one, spanning nearly five months since its launch from Florida aboard a SpaceX rocket. The lunar lander, developed by Ispace, offers an alternative approach to lunar missions by opting for a low-energy transfer route, thus conserving fuel by allowing the moon’s gravity to guide it into orbit naturally.

Despite its slower trajectory, Ispace sees value in this methodical approach. Chief Financial Officer Jumpei Nozaki explained that the extended travel time allows for continuous learning and system verification, providing mission operators with a rare opportunity to fine-tune their techniques over an extended period of deep-space travel.

This careful strategy doesn’t come without its risks. Ispace's first attempt to land a spacecraft on the moon ended in a crash in April 2023. Nevertheless, lessons from that experience have informed their current mission. This time, the Resilience lander is targeting a safer, flatter landing site in Mare Frigoris, a plain in the moon’s far northern regions, selected for its navigational ease.

Highlighting the significance of this mission are the science instruments onboard Resilience. These include a module for testing algae-based food production, a deep-space radiation monitor, and a water electrolyzer experiment intended to generate hydrogen and oxygen on the lunar surface. These instruments underscore the scientific ambitions integrated into this commercial quest.

Though Ispace has benefitted from their slow and steady pace, future missions will not follow this prolonged approach. The upcoming Apex 1.0 lunar lander is planned to take a more direct route, responding to customer wants for quicker results and reducing the exposure of valuable instruments to the harsh conditions of space.

If successful, Ispace will join Firefly Aerospace in achieving a fully upright landing of a commercial lunar lander - a significant milestone outside the realm of U.S. space enterprises. This success would further enrich the global tapestry of space exploration, paving the way for future scientific discoveries and human missions under NASA’s Artemis program.