Comparison of Asian national space programs to fuel future energy demands in Asia. All three main Asian space powers plan to send men to the Moon in the distant future and have already sent lunar probes. Japan was the first Asian country to launch a lunar probe. The Hiten (Japanese: "flying angel") spacecraft (known before the launch as MUSES-A), built by the Institute of Space and Astronautical Science of Japan, was launched on 24 January 1990. In many ways, the mission did not go as was planned. Kaguya, the second Japanese lunar orbiter spacecraft, was launched on 14 September 2007. China launched its first lunar probe,
Antoniadi (lunar crater) unusually flat and smooth, with the central peak being the only notable feature. The floor outside the inner ring is much rougher in texture. The most notable crater on the interior floor lies across the eastern edge of the southern inner ring range. The bottom of Antoniadi crater is measured—by using the laser altimeter (LALT) instrument on board the Japanese Selenological and Engineering Explorer (SELENE) satellite—to be the lowest point on the moon (provisionally named Point Trieste after the Bathysphere Trieste that was the first vehicle to descend to the world's deepest point) and rests 9 kilometers (more than 5.5