08 December 2018
China's Chang'e-4 lunar probe was launched in the early hours of 08 December, and it is expected to make the first-ever soft landing on the far side of the Moon. A Long March-3B rocket, carrying the probe including a lander and a rover, blasted off from the Xichang Satellite Launch Center in southwest China's Sichuan Province at 2:23 h Beijing Time, opening a new chapter in lunar exploration.
The scientific tasks of the Chang'e-4 mission include low-frequency radio astronomical observation, surveying the terrain and landforms, detecting the mineral composition and shallow lunar surface structure, and measuring the neutron radiation and neutral atoms to study the environment on the far side of the moon, the China National Space Administration announced.
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link to launch video
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China launches Chang'e-4 probe to shed light on Moon's dark side
Backgrounder: China's journeys to the Moon
press release (in German) by University Kiel about its Lunar Lander Neutron Dosimetry experiment on Chang'e 4