Scientists have used radar technology to shed new light on the moon’s subsoil.
The researchers used the miniature radio frequency (Mini-RF) instrument on NASA’s Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) spacecraft to analyze the moon. In a statement, NASA explained that the lunar subsoil may be richer in metals, such as iron and titanium, than previously thought.
The space agency is interested in obtaining as much information as possible about the moon’s resources. NASA’s Artemis program aims to land American astronauts on the lunar surface by 2024 and establish a sustainable human presence on Earth’s natural satellite.
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“Substantial evidence points to the moon as a product of a collision between a Mars-sized protoplanet and the young Earth, which is formed from the gravitational collapse of the remaining debris cloud,” NASA said in the statement. “Consequently, the moon’s bulk chemical composition closely resembles that of Earth.”
This image based on data from NASA’s Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter spacecraft shows the face of the Moon that we see from Earth.
(Credits: NASA / GSFC / Arizona State University)
However, there are key differences that have puzzled scientists for a long time. “On the bright plains on the moon’s surface, called the lunar highlands, rocks contain smaller amounts of metals-containing minerals relative to Earth,” NASA said. “That finding could be explained if Earth had fully differentiated into a core, mantle, and crust before impact, leaving the moon largely metal-poor. But turn to the moon maria, the darker great plains, and the abundance of metals becomes richer than that of many rocks on Earth. “
To solve this mystery, the scientists used Mini-RF to measure the electrical property, known as the dielectric constant, of the lunar soil in the craters of the moon’s northern hemisphere. The researchers found that the electrical properties increased with the size of the crater for craters approximately 1 to 3 miles wide. However, for craters 3 to 12 miles wide, electrical ownership remained constant.
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The discovery offers a new insight into the moon’s formation. “Because the larger crater-forming meteors also dig deeper into the moon’s subsoil, the team reasoned that the increasing dielectric constant of dust in the larger craters could be the result of digging iron oxide meteors. and titanium below the surface, “NASA added in the statement. “The dielectric properties are directly related to the concentration of these metallic minerals.”
If this hypothesis is true, only the first few hundred meters of the moon’s surface possess few iron and titanium oxides, according to NASA. “But below the surface, there is a steady increase in a rich and unexpected bonanza,” he said.
The scientists compared Mini-RF radar images to metal oxide maps from the LRO wide-angle camera, Japan’s Kaguya mission, and NASA’s Lunar Prospector spacecraft. “The larger craters, with their higher dielectric material, were also richer in metals, suggesting that more iron and titanium oxides have been excavated from depths of 0.3 to 1 mile (0.5 to 2 kilometers) than from higher depths. 0.1 to 0.3 miles (0.2 to 0.5 kilometers) from the lunar subsoil, ”NASA explained.
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The research is published in the journal Earth and Planetary Science Letters. “It was an amazing relationship that we had no reason to believe would exist,” Essam Heggy, lead author of the paper and co-investigator of the Mini-RF experiments at the University of Southern California, Los Angeles, said in the statement.
“The LRO mission and its radar instrument continue to surprise us with new insights into the origins and complexity of our closest neighbor,” said Wes Patterson, Mini-RF principal investigator at the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory (APL) in Laurel, Maryland. and a co-author of the study.
In a separate project, an international team of scientists recently provided an explanation for the “strange asymmetry” of the moon’s dark side, which has a different composition than the near side facing Earth.
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When the first images from the other side of the moon emerged decades ago, scientists realized that it has almost no “maria” or dark regions (from Latin for the sea). The researchers explained that only 1 percent on the far side was covered in maria compared to 31 percent on the near side.
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The new research suggests that this is because the radioactive elements were “uniquely distributed” after the moon collision.
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