Planetary Science

Lunar Atmosphere and Dust Environment Explorer (LADEE)

Orbiter · Directed · Agency-led · Launched on September 7, 2013 · Completed · LCC: $263M/$378M (2025 $)Life-cycle cost: NASA’s reported cost to build, launch, and operate a mission through its prime mission, plus documented partner contributions, in 2025 dollars. Extended missions are not included. Methods · Wikipedia

Scope Active Mission WindowActivePapers published from the first full month after science operations begin through two years after the mission ends. Citations are counted through the third calendar year after each paper appears. For LADEE, papers published December 1, 2013 to May 1, 2016. Methods LifetimeLifetimeEvery tracked publication to date, with every citation to date. For LADEE, papers published from 2014 to November 3, 2026. Methods
Tracked publicationsTracked publications: peer-reviewed papers we found that name the mission or its instruments in their titles, abstracts, or keywords. Papers that used the data without naming it are missed. Methods75
CitationsCitations: every citation these publications have drawn to date. Older missions have had longer to collect them. Methods1,775
Citation indices
h-indexh-index: the largest h such that h papers have at least h citations each. It only grows with time, so older missions score higher. Methods25
g-indexg-index: the largest g for which the g most-cited papers together hold at least g² citations. Like the h-index, but it lets the most-cited papers count for more. Methods40
m-indexm-index: a mission’s h-index divided by the years since its first peer-reviewed paper. It falls every 1 January even when nothing else changes; the figure shown is as of November 3, 2026. It also discounts the long operating life that larger missions paid for. Methods1.9
toritori (total research impact, from SciX): for every paper citing one of the mission’s papers, 1 divided by the citing paper’s reference count times the cited paper’s author count, summed, with self-citations removed. It favors citations from papers with short reference lists and from outside the mission’s own authors. Computed over the tracked citation graph, which can be slightly incomplete. Always over every tracked publication to date, whichever scope is chosen. Methods12
riqriq (research impact quotient): 1,000 times the square root of tori, divided by the years since the mission’s first paper. A rate, not a total, so it does not keep growing with age the way the h-index and tori do. Like tori, always over every tracked publication to date. Methods270

Publications and citations by year (lifetime)

Publications per yearCumulative citations

Institutional contributions (lifetime)The institutions SciX lists for each paper’s authors, as printed on the paper, located through the Research Organization Registry. A square counts a paper once, however many of its authors worked there. Methods

Loading the map…

Tracked publications over the lifetime (75)

All publications CSV · JSON

  1. Lunar dust and dusty plasmas: Recent developments, advances, and unsolved problems

    Popel, S. I., 2018, P&SS

    118 lifetime citations

  2. Lunar soil hydration constrained by exospheric water liberated by meteoroid impacts

    Benna, M., 2019, NatGe

    117 lifetime citations

  3. The Lunar Dust Experiment (LDEX) Onboard the Lunar Atmosphere and Dust Environment Explorer (LADEE) Mission

    Horányi, M., 2014, SSRv

    101 lifetime citations

  4. Variability of helium, neon, and argon in the lunar exosphere as observed by the LADEE NMS instrument

    Benna, M., 2015, GeoRL

    88 lifetime citations

  5. Meteoroids at the Moon: Orbital Properties, Surface Vaporization, and Impact Ejecta Production

    Pokorný, Petr, 2019, JGRE

    88 lifetime citations

  6. The Lunar Atmosphere and Dust Environment Explorer Mission

    Elphic, R. C., 2014, SSRv

    68 lifetime citations

  7. How surface composition and meteoroid impacts mediate sodium and potassium in the lunar exosphere

    Colaprete, A., 2016, Sci

    68 lifetime citations

  8. Commercial lunar propellant architecture: A collaborative study of lunar propellant production

    Kornuta, David, 2019, Reach

    61 lifetime citations

  9. Lunar meteoritic gardening rate derived from in situ LADEE/LDEX measurements

    Szalay, Jamey R., 2016, GeoRL

    58 lifetime citations

  10. Upper limits for a lunar dust exosphere from far-ultraviolet spectroscopy by LRO/LAMP

    Feldman, Paul D., 2014, Icar

    54 lifetime citations

  11. The search for electrostatically lofted grains above the Moon with the Lunar Dust Experiment

    Szalay, Jamey R., 2015, GeoRL

    52 lifetime citations

  12. The Neutral Mass Spectrometer on the Lunar Atmosphere and Dust Environment Explorer Mission

    Mahaffy, Paul R., 2014, SSRv

    50 lifetime citations

  13. Detections of lunar exospheric ions by the LADEE neutral mass spectrometer

    Halekas, J. S., 2015, GeoRL

    46 lifetime citations

  14. Annual variation and synodic modulation of the sporadic meteoroid flux to the Moon

    Szalay, Jamey R., 2015, GeoRL

    45 lifetime citations

  15. The Lunar Laser Communication Demonstration: NASA's First Step Toward Very High Data Rate Support of Science and Exploration Missions

    Boroson, Don M., 2014, SSRv

    42 lifetime citations

  16. Meteoroid Impacts as a Source of Bennu's Particle Ejection Events

    Bottke, W. F., 2020, JGRE

    41 lifetime citations

  17. Methane in the lunar exosphere: Implications for solar wind carbon escape

    Hodges, R. Richard, 2016, GeoRL

    39 lifetime citations

  18. Impacts of fast meteoroids and a plasma-dust cloud over the lunar surface

    Popel, S. I., 2017, JETPL

    34 lifetime citations

  19. Meteoritic influence on sodium and potassium abundance in the lunar exosphere measured by LADEE

    Szalay, Jamey R., 2016, GeoRL

    32 lifetime citations

  20. Lunar exospheric argon modeling

    Grava, Cesare, 2015, Icar

    31 lifetime citations

How we found these papers

We searched NASA’s Science Explorer (SciX) for peer-reviewed articles naming LADEE in the title, abstract or keywords; standard filters drop articles that are not peer-reviewed and magazine pieces.

((=abs:"Lunar Atmosphere and Dust Environment Explorer" OR ((abs:LADEE OR abs:LDEX OR =abs:"Lunar Dust Experiment") AND abs:(Moon OR lunar OR dust)))) AND property:refereed AND doctype:article AND pubdate:[2013-12 TO 2040-01] AND NOT bibstem:("A&R" OR "ACPD" OR "AIASJ" OR "AMTD" OR "AeAm" OR "AirSp" OR "AsNow" OR "AsUAI" OR "AvWST" OR "BGD" OR "C&E" OR "C&T" OR "CAPJ" OR "CliPD" OR "E&S" OR "ENews" OR "ESDD" OR "ESSDD" OR "ESuDD" OR "GID" OR "GMDD" OR "GeCAS" OR "HESSD" OR "IrAJ" OR "JCos" OR "JRASC" OR "LAstr" OR "MNSSA" OR "Met" OR "NHESD" OR "NPGD" OR "NewSc" OR "OcScD" OR "Orion" OR "PhT" OR "PhTea" OR "PhuZ" OR "PhyOJ" OR "PhyW" OR "PlR" OR "SOILD" OR "SciAm" OR "SpFl" OR "TCD" OR "ZemVs")

Open in SciX

Removed after review (4)

  1. 2011SSRv..165....3A Overview of the ARTEMIS mission; mentions LADEE only as a concurrent mission. Decision 👨
  2. To the Moon with LADEE Journal editorial introducing LADEE; not a research paper. Decision 🤖
  3. Seven days: 18-24 April 2014 Weekly news digest noting LADEE's impact; not a research paper. Decision 🤖
  4. Foreword. The Lunar Atmosphere and Dust Environment Explorer Mission Foreword to a journal special issue; not a research paper. Decision 🤖