NASA's CAPSTONE Satellite Begins Extended Mission

I've been following and trying to keep up with NASA's CAPSTONE (Cislunar Autonomous Positioning System Technology Operations and Navigation Experiment) mission since first hearing of the mission just before the launch last June.  The story showed up today at Space.com that "NASA's tiny CAPSTONE probe snaps 1st photo of the moon, begins extended mission" and I realized I hadn't heard anything about the little cubesat since it reached its intended Near Rectilinear Halo Orbit (NRHO) back last November.   

The headline is that CAPSTONE snapped its first photo of the moon.  The photo is posted by Space.com.  Let's be charitable and say this is a test photo so we shouldn't expect too much of it.  The reality is that millions of amateur astronomers have taken better photos of the moon from our backyards, whether by telescope or perhaps just with a telephoto lens.  Let me just post it here:

NASA's CAPSTONE cubesat, built and operated by Colorado company Advanced Space, snapped this photo of the moon on May 3, 2023. It's the first lunar image by the cubesat. (Image credit: ©Advanced Space 2023, all rights reserved)

Let's just assume photo quality wasn't really a mission goal.  The photo was part of an extended test of operation in the new orbit that's central to the new lunar missions including Artemis, the Gateway and the planned returns to the moon.  

In the NRHO, CAPSTONE gets as close as 11,000 miles (17,700 kilometers) to one lunar pole during a near pass and then as far away as 43,500 miles (70,000 km) from the other pole every seven days. The microwave-sized satellite imaged the lunar surface for the first time on May 3, as it made a close pass by the north pole.

Six days later, on May 9, CAPSTONE teamed up with NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter to test a new navigation method using equipment on CAPSTONE - the CAPS portion of the name - the Cislunar Autonomous Positioning System.  

During the successful May 9 experiment, CAPSTONE teamed up with NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO), which has been circling the moon since 2009. CAPSTONE beamed a signal to LRO, which bounced it back to the tiny spacecraft, where it was converted into a measurement of the distance and relative velocity between the two probes.

"The test proved the ability to collect measurements that will be utilized by CAPS software to determine the positioning of both spacecraft," NASA officials wrote in an update last week. "This capability could provide autonomous onboard navigation information for future lunar missions."

The Space.com article doesn't say much about what the rest of the mission is going to focus on, but says CAPSTONE has just begun an "enhanced mission phase" which will last around a year and will see the spacecraft continue testing its onboard technology.