Characterization of recent impact craters on the Moon by the upcoming MANI mission.

 

The surface of the Moon is shaped by the impact processes, with new ones being formed as we watch (Robinson et al., 2015, Speyerer et al. 2016, Fairweather et al. 2022, Rizos et al. 2026). Understanding the current impact rate is crucial for the safety of the future lunar missions, determining the rate of foreign material delivery, defining the space weathering rates, and better understanding the shallow seismic sources before new seismometers will be deployed there to probe the lunar crust (Yamada et al., 2011). Impacts of particles larger than a gram can sometimes be observed as lunar flashes (Ortiz et al., 2000) that are formed because a small fraction (<0.5%) of the impact energy is released as a flash of light.

Over 600 lunar flashes has been observed up to this point (Sheward et al., 2023). Those events last ∼10 ms to a ∼1 s (Bouley et al., 2012). To better determine the properties of the impactor, it is necessary to better constrain the energy partitioning during the observed impact flashes. This can be done by identifying and characterizing the craters formed because of such an event. Because those craters are in the order of meters, most of those craters are still unknown. In fact, only a couple of craters were unequivocally linked with a newly formed crater, e.g., an event on 17th March 2013 was shown to be associated with an 18.8 m diameter crater (Mark S. Robinson et al., 2015). Hundreds of recent craters were also identified based on pre- and post- impact pairs of LRO images (Speyerer et al. 2016).

Efforts to study these craters were limited by the absence of high-resolution, specifically targeted images.  For example, LRO’s NAC with a ~0.5 m/px resolution at 50 km altitude only allows the identification of craters larger than a couple of meters in diameter, and to properly measure the properties of the craters, they need to be at least >>10 meters in diameter (Sheward et al., 2022). Unfortunately, there are only a couple of craters of this size.

MANI MISSION, approved in December 2025 for A/B1 mission stage by ESA, will map the lunar surface using high-resolution imagery and create detailed 3D maps of the Moon’s terrain with resolution of ~20 cm /px. It will be accomplished by employing a targeted multi-angular photoclinometric mapping approach to chart the Moon’s key regions of interest. Its goal is to acquire orbital images of the lunar surface, including the polar regions, at the highest possible resolution across a wide range of observation geometries. From these images, Máni will produce detailed maps of topography and reflectance properties at a resolution comparable to that of the images themselves.

This new dataset will allow us to characterize in 3D craters only a couple meters in diameter, and thus substantially improve our ability to understand the current impact rate on the Moon, the energy partitioning on airless bodies as well as use crater properties to back-engineer the properties of target rocks all over the Moon.