Science

Oded Aharonson

Mission Scientist

Oded received BS and MS degrees in Applied Physics from Cornell University, served in the Israeli Air Force, earned a PhD from MIT, and was a professor at Caltech for 10 years. Aharonson returned to the Weizmann Institute, where he leads the Center for Planetary Science. Aharonson participates in many spacecraft investigations including the Mars Rovers, and the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter.

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SpaceIL is a non-profit organization established in 2011 aiming to land the first Israeli spacecraft on the Moon. The organization was founded by three young engineers: Yariv Bash, Kfir Damari and Yonatan Winetraub who answered the international challenge presented by Google Lunar XPRIZE: to build, launch and land an unmanned spacecraft on the Moon. SpaceIL was the only Israeli representative. In October 2015, SpaceIL reached a dramatic project milestone by becoming the first team to announce a signed launch contract, that symbolizes an actual "ticket to the Moon". In January 2017, SpaceIL became one of the competition’s five finalists. The competition officially ended with no winners in March 31, 2018, after Google ended their sponsorship.
Regardless of the competition, SpaceIL is committed to continue and complete its mission, to land on the Moon and to the advancement of science and technology education in Israel.
SpaceIL is actively working to create an Israeli "Apollo Effect.” SpaceIL is committed to inspiring the next generation in Israel and around the world to choose to study science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM).
The launch will take place on an American SpaceX rocket in first quarter of 2019, and the Moon landing will be at the end of a two-month journey in space, after the launch. Read More

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