Recent Findings from Restored Apollo Magnetic Field Records

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Recent Findings from Restored Apollo Magnetic Field Records

Chi, P. J. / Russell, C. T. / Williams, D. R.

On November 19, 1969, Apollo 12 astronauts installed a Lunar Surface Magnetometer (LSM) as a part ofthe Apollo Lunar Surface Experiment Package, making the first magnetic field measurement on aplanetary body other than Earth. The subsequent Apollo missions deployed two more LSM's (Apollos 15and 16), two Lunar Portable Magnetometers (Apollos 14 and 15), and two Sub-satellite BiaxialMagnetometers (SBMs of Apollos 15 and 16). After almost a half century, the Apollo 15 and 16 missionsare still the only lunar missions conducting simultaneous surface and orbital magnetic field experiments.The Apollo magnetic field experiments enabled many first discoveries, including the lunar magneticanomalies and the electrical conductivity of the Moon. Since the Apollo era, the archaic data format hasbeen hampering the re-examination of Apollo magnetic field records until recently. We have nowrestored most of the digital Apollo magnetic field records archived at NSSDC, including the 0.3-s datafrom the Apollo 12, 15 and 16 LSMs and the 24-s data from Apollo 15 and 16 SBMs. The restored LSMdata have revealed many narrowband ion cyclotron waves in the Earth's magnetotail that were not