Free Astronomy Magazine July-August 2021

JULY-AUGUST 2021 ural satellite, the maximum resolu- tion with which we can regularly in- vestigate its surface is that of 100 m/pixel offered by NASA’s Lunar Re- connaissance Orbiter (LRO). An in- terstellar probe can be expected to be much smaller than that size, to ensure the shortest possible travel time. Indeed, since it is necessary to reach fractions of the speed of light, the mass must be reduced to the es- sential (according to our current knowledge). LRO is, however, also capable of a much better resolution, 0.5 m/pixel, but this is only used on small areas of particular interest, such as the Apollo landing sites and those of other past and future missions. Map- ping the entire lunar surface at that very high resolution would require telemetry capabilities not yet avail- able, or the development of ma- chine learning techniques that are just in their infancy, but which are indispensable for having most of the processing carried out directly by ar- tificial intelligence aboard a lunar mapper. Only the images of anom- alous structures would be sent to Earth for in-depth analysis. The search for technosignatures is a relatively young branch of astrobi- ology, and some of its aspects may raise perplexity. However, it is also the only one among all the scientific disciplines that will be able to tell us if there is someone else out there who is aware of the universe. !