In the context of future lunar missions, the evaluation of the effect of particulate contamination on materials performance is required. Particularly, the evolution in thermo-optical properties of representative materials needs to be investigated as a function of dust coverage. The final objective is to predict the change in performance over time of surfaces exposed to natural or man-induced particulate contamination. This complicate task requires mastering the Lunar Dust Simulant deposit in terms of quantity (percentage area coverage or PAC), uniformity (monolayer, accumulation of LDS...) and reproducibility.

This paper will describe the approach and set-up developed to investigate the effect of dust on a large set of space grade materials. Dust deposits are performed in Dust Deposit Chamber. A Nikon LV100 D microscope equipped with a motorized plate is used to observe dust particles on flat samples. It embeds a 2D/3D reconstruction mapping and a particle counting software to measure the particle size distribution. A sample interface with commercial spectrophotometer and emissometer allows for reflectance (solar absorptance) and emissivity measurements.

This poster will also present the experimental setup designed to study and characterize physical mechanisms at the root of dust adhesion. The DROP (Dust Regolith and Particles) facility is dedicated to LDS and technical material testing under electrostatic charging conditions representative of the lunar space environment. A centrifuge system measures the adhesion force between dust particles and a substrate by applying a detaching acceleration up to 250 gs under vacuum and under charging conditions.