The twin Gravity Recovery And Interior Laboratory (GRAIL) spacecraft arrived this week at NASA's Kennedy Space Center. There the spacecraft will undergo final testing and processing before launching on a Delta II Heavy launch vehicle later this year. According to NASA: "The Gravity Recovery And Interior Laboratory (GRAIL) mission will create the most accurate gravitational map of the Moon to date, improving our knowledge of near-side gravity by 100 times and of far-side gravity by 1000 times. Accurate knowledge of the gravity will be an invaluable navigational aid to future lunar spacecraft." MIT is home to the mission's principal investigator Dr. Maria Zuber.

For more information about the GRAIL mission check out : http://solarsystem.nasa.gov/grail and http://www.lockheedmartin.com/grail

 

Follow us on Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/nextgiantleap
Like us on Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/nextgiantleap