SILVER: Surface Imaging for Lunar Volatiles, Resources, and Exploration

The Surface Imaging for Lunar Volatiles, Exploration, and Resources (SILVER) instrument is a proposed imaging investigation for the 2008 Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) mission. SILVER and its experienced Measurement Team will prepare for and support future lunar human exploration activities, especially landing site identification and certification on the basis of potential resources. SILVER combines a high-resolution pushbroom visible imaging channel (SILVER-HR) and a wide-field-of-view (45 deg) framing imaging channel (SILVER-WF). SILVER-HR will obtain a single-detector 6 km imaging swath of 12,228 pixels at 0.5 m/pixel to image greater than 100 sq km target areas from 50 km altitude, imaging greater than 15% the lunar surface during a 1 year nominal mission. SILVER-HR has excellent stray-light rejection and its imaging detector has selectable time delay integration (TDI) with up to 128 stages for extreme low-light sensitivity, permitting direct imaging of permanently shadowed polar regions in scattered sunlight or earthshine. SILVER-WF will obtain geodetic framing images in a 2048 x 2048 format at 20m/pixel, with 60% along-track overlap stereo for imaging context and for derivation of a global digital elevation model of meter-scale lunar topography.