Lunar Gravitational Maps 2026 (LGM2026)

LGM2026 is a suite of maps showing the lunar gravitational field at the lunar topography and on its circumscribing sphere. Depicted are the gravitational potential, the gravitational vector and the gravitational tensor at a spatial resolution of 128 pixels per degree (~250 m at the equator). LGM2026 relies on observed GRAIL gravity (harmonic degrees up to 500, wavelengths up to 11 km at the equator) and gravity modeled from topography using a 3D crustal density model (harmonic degrees beyond 500, wavelengths shorter than 11 km at the equator). The maps on the circumscribing sphere have been transformed into a spherical harmonic expansion of the lunar gravitational field up to degree 11519. All maps use the Moon's principal axes coordinate system. LGM2026 can be beneficial for near-surface applications that are sensitive to variations of the lunar gravitational field such as spacecraft navigation, inertial navigation or gravity field simulations. Given that the gravitational signals beyond the 11-km resolution are modeled from topography, they cannot, however, be geophysically or geologically interpreted. The structure of the repository is explained in the README file. This work was funded by the EU NextGenerationEU through the Recovery and Resilience Plan for Slovakia under the project No. 09I03-03-V04-00273.