China on Monday published a set of full coverage of moon map and moon images with a resolution of seven meters captured by the country's second moon orbiter, the Chang'e-2. (Xinhua Photo)

BEIJING, Feb. 6 (Xinhua) -- China on Monday published a full coverage map of the moon, as well as several high-resolution images of the celestial body, captured by the country's second moon orbiter, the Chang'e-2.

The map and images, released by the State Administration of Science, Technology and Industry for National Defence (SASTIND), are the highest-resolution photos of the entirety of the moon's surface to be published thus far, said Liu Dongkui, deputy chief commander of China's lunar probe project.

The images were photographed by a charge-coupled device (CCD) stereo camera on the Chang'e-2 from heights of 100 km and 15 km over the lunar surface between October 2010 and May 2011, according to a statement from SASTIND.

The resolution of the images obtained from Chang'e-2 is 17 times greater than those taken by the its predecessor, the Chang'e-1.

"Credit: CNSA / tv.people.com.cn On October 8, 2010, Chang'E 2 fires its main engine to reduce the size of its lunar orbit, as the Moon swings through the field of view in the background. The firing of the engine begins just after the terminator passes out of view (from the camera's point of view). As the spacecraft drops completely into the lunar shadow, the camera's automatic exposure setting adjusts brighter, making part of the spacecraft visible in light emitted from the glowing thruster."

China has published its first map of the entire lunar surface. The map was created using imagery obtained by the China's Chang'e 1 lunar orbiting spacecraft. Larger image here. We hope to produce something like this as well once all of our Lunar Orbiter images have been recovered and enhanced.

The image is a mosaic of 19 images taken by the spacecraft on November 20 and 21. It covers an area of 460 kilometers by 280 kilometers located at 54 to 70 degrees south latitude and 57 to 83 degrees east longitude. It was taken at an altitude of 200 kilometers by the stereo CCD camera. The resolution is 120 meters per pixel.