Why would NASA want to set up a time zone on the moon?

narrator

NASA is tasked with determining the moon’s standard time zone, but it’s more complicated than you think.

The U.S. government has tasked its space agency, NASA, to establish a standard time zone for the moon, called Coordinated Lunar Time (CLT).

In a memo released on April 2, the U.S. Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) said: Federal agencies will develop celestial time standardization, initially focusing on missions operating on the lunar surface and in cislunar space. [the area within the moons orbit], with sufficient traceability to support missions to other celestial bodies. Traceability means CLT can be synchronized with time zones on Earth.

The memo outlines the following features of the new CLT:

• Dated to Coordinated Universal Time (UTC is a compromise for English and French speakers);
• Accurate enough to support precise navigation and science;
• Resilience to loss of contact with Earth (meaning CLT can operate independently of Earth); and
• It can be extended to space environments beyond the Earth-Moon system (meaning other space stations other than the moon can also use CLT).

Don’t expect your favorite time zone and calendar app to have CLT as an option; NASA has until the end of 2026 to build CLT.

Why does the moon need its own time zone?

In layman’s terms, we need a reliable lunar time geosynchronous system because the lower gravity on the moon causes time on the moon to move slightly faster than on Earth, only 58.7 microseconds faster per 24 Earth days ( There are 1 million microseconds in a second) hour.

This isn’t science fiction, even though it’s a staple of Hollywood blockbusters like “Star Effect.” The passage of time is affected by gravity, called gravitational time dilation.

Although these time differences are small, they can cause synchronization problems for satellites and space stations in lunar orbit.

“Imagine how disruptive that would be if clocks around the world were not synchronized to the same time, and how challenging day-to-day tasks would be,” an Office of Science and Technology Policy official told Reuters on condition of anonymity.

How do we know the time on the moon?

Earth uses UTC, or Coordinated Universal Time, to synchronize time zones around the world. UTC is determined by more than 400 atomic clocks maintained by national time laboratories in approximately 30 countries around the world. Atomic clocks use the vibrations of atoms to achieve extremely precise recordings of time.

Similar atomic clocks will be placed on the moon to obtain accurate time readings.

This precision timing system, called Positioning, Navigation and Timing (PNT), allows communications systems to measure and maintain accurate timing. The Ordnance Survey, a British organization that has been producing maps since 1791, explains that the PNT has three core elements:

• Positioning enables the precise determination of a person’s position and orientation, primarily in two dimensions on a printed map, although three-dimensional orientation can be determined when required.
• Navigation is the ability to determine current and desired positions (relative or absolute) and to make corrections to course, direction and speed to reach the desired position from anywhere in the world, from underground (below the Earth’s surface) to the surface, from the surface to space .
• Timekeeping is able to maintain accurate and precise time anywhere in the world.

Does NASA have any plans to establish time zones in other areas of outer space?

Although there was no mention of time zones on other planets, in 2019 NASA’s Deep Space Atomic Clock (DSAC) mission tested atomic clocks to improve spacecraft navigation in deep space. The DSAC mission was launched on June 22, 2019, by a SpaceX Falcon Heavy rocket.

Normally, spacecraft keep accurate time by bouncing signals to atomic clocks on Earth and then sending the signals back to the spacecraft. On this mission, the onboard atomic clock was tested to keep accurate time without relying on two-way communication between the spacecraft and atomic clocks on Earth. The accuracy of timing is closely related to accurate positioning and helps the spacecraft successfully reach its intended location in space.

As NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (Center for Robotic Exploration of the Solar System) explains: A two-way system sends signals from Earth to a spacecraft, back to Earth, and back to the spacecraft again, taking an average of 40 minutes. Imagine if the GPS on your phone took 40 minutes to calculate your location. You might miss a turn, or it might take you a few exits on the highway before it catches up to you.If humans went to the red planet [Mars]it would be better if the system were one-way, allowing explorers to determine their current location immediately rather than waiting for that information to come back from Earth.

The mission ended successfully in 2021, and the onboard atomic clock maintained correct timing and navigation positioning.