Discovery: Water on the Moon is Widespread, Similar to Earth’s
Last fall, researchers, including Larry Taylor, a distinguished professor in the Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences, discovered “lunar dew” on the moon’s surface — absorbed “water” in the uppermost layers of lunar soil. This discovery of water debunked beliefs held since the return of the first Apollo rocks that the moon was bone-dry.
Now, scientists, including Taylor and Yang Liu, research assistant professor in the Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences, have discovered that water on the moon is more widespread — on the outside and inside of the moon — with some similarities to water in volcanic systems on Earth.
Their research will be featured in the article, “Lunar Apatite with Terrestrial Volatile Abundances” in the July 22 edition of the scientific journal, Nature.
Unlike lunar dew which is believed to come from an outside source such as solar wind which brings hydrogen into contact with the Moon’s oxygen, the water discovered by Taylor and Liu is internal, arising from an entirely different origin. How it got there is not yet known. The water may have been added by impacting comets, which contain ice, during or after the formation of the moon and Earth. (more…)
How the Moon Produces Its Own Water
Moon, seen from Chandrayaan-1 on 4 November 2008, from a distance of about 311200 km. (ISRO)
The Moon is a big sponge that absorbs electrically charged particles given out by the Sun. These particles interact with the oxygen present in some dust grains on the lunar surface, producing water. This discovery, made by the ESA-ISRO instrument SARA onboard the Indian Chandrayaan-1 lunar orbiter, confirms how water is likely being created on the lunar surface.
It also gives scientists an ingenious new way to take images of the Moon and any other airless body in the Solar System.
The lunar surface is a loose collection of irregular dust grains, known as regolith. Incoming particles should be trapped in the spaces between the grains and absorbed. When this happens to protons they are expected to interact with the oxygen in the lunar regolith to produce hydroxyl and water. The signature for these molecules was recently found and reported by Chandrayaan-1’s Moon Mineralogy Mapper (M3) instrument team.
The SARA results confirm that solar hydrogen nuclei are indeed being absorbed by the lunar regolith but also highlight a mystery: not every proton is absorbed. One out of every five rebounds into space. In the process, the proton joins with an electron to become an atom of hydrogen. “We didn’t expect to see this at all,” says Stas Barabash, Swedish Institute of Space Physics, who is the European Principal Investigator for the Sub-keV Atom Reflecting Analyzer (SARA) instrument, which made the discovery. (more…)
NASA Crashes Two-Ton Rocket Into The Moon Friday
Key lunar landmarks used to locate Cabeus crater, the site of the LCROSS crash, are colored and labeled in this view. The yellow scale shows angular distances in the plane of the impact site; blue arcs show heights 50, 100 and 200 kilometers above it. (NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center Scientific Visualization Studio)
At 7:30 a.m. EDT on October 9, a two-ton rocket body will slam into a crater near the moon’s south pole. By studying the resulting plume of gas and dust, scientists hope this grand experiment will confirm the presence of ice in permanently shadowed craters at the lunar poles.
The event is the highlight of NASA’s Lunar Crater Observation and Sensing Satellite (LCROSS) mission. The LCROSS spacecraft flies behind its empty upper stage, which is targeted to strike the floor of Cabeus crater. LCROSS will image the impact and provide direct measurements of the plume before it also plunges into the lunar surface. With LCROSS gone, further measurements of the cloud depend on ground-based observatories around the world.
“This is a completely unique mission that will excavate two large holes dozens of meters across on the lunar surface. It will give us composition measurements we wouldn’t otherwise be able to get,” said Tim McClanahan, a scientist at Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md. (more…)
Key Process for Space Outpost Proved on ‘Vomit Comet’ Ride
Flying high over the Gulf of Mexico, researchers from NASA and Case Western Reserve University found a key to unlocking oxygen from the surface of the moon.
The celestial body has no atmosphere like Earth’s, holding the precious element just a breath away. But, oxygen to breathe, grow food, create water and burn rocket fuel – to make a space outpost a reality - is trapped in its soils.
Scientists from NASA and Case Western Reserve are designing and testing components of an oxygen generator that would extract the element from silicon dioxide and metal oxides in the ground. They have designed sifters needed to produce a consistent supply of oxides. But, how would the sifters work in the moon’s gravity, which is about one-sixth as strong as the Earth’s?
To find out, Katie Fromwiller, a senior civil engineering student, and Julie Kleinhenz, an assistant research professor of aerospace and mechanical engineering, spent two days flying in high arcs off the Texas coast last month. (more…)
New Research Shows Water Present Across the Moon’s Surface
It turns out the moon is a lot wetter than we ever thought.
When Apollo astronauts returned from the moon 40 years ago, they brought back souvenirs in the form of moon rocks to be used for scientific analysis, and one of the chief questions was whether there was water to be found in the lunar rocks and soils.
The problem was they faced was complicated by the fact that most of the rock boxes containing the lunar samples had leaked. This led the scientists to assume that the trace amounts of water they found came from Earth air that had entered the containers. The assumption remained that, outside of possible ice at the moon’s poles, there was no water on the moon.
Forty years later, a team of scientists including Larry Taylor of the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, has found evidence that the old assumption may be wrong. To do so, they used a high-tech instrument on a satellite in orbit around the moon. (more…)
Google Lunar X PRIZE contender Odyssey Moon Announces Teaming with Industry Leaders
Lunar Lander Prototype – The Odyssey Moon “M-1” lunar lander will be adapted from the Common Spacecraft Bus developed at the NASA Ames Research Center. Pictured above is the Hover Test Vehicle used for ground testing. (Photo courtesy NASA and OMV)
Google Lunar X PRIZE contender Odyssey Moon Limited announced last week that top industry leaders Near Earth LLC, WPP Group, Aon and Milbank have joined its corporate team. Odyssey Moon intends to become the first private company to supply payload delivery services to the Moon in support of science, exploration and commerce. This is the first time such major organizations have come together to support a commercial Moon venture.
As the world celebrates the 40th anniversary of “Moon 1.0” – mankind’s first but short lived activities on the lunar surface – Odyssey Moon is forging ahead with its plans to capitalize on commercial opportunities created by renewed interests in exploring the Moon – “Moon 2.0”. (more…)
Google Releases Moon in Google Earth
On July 20, 2009, Google released Moon in Google Earth, a free and intuitive piece of software that allows users to see stunning data from five decades of lunar missions in context and in the highest qualities possible. More than ever before, the rest of us are now able to recreate the experiences of the 24 men who orbited around or landed on the surface of our celestial neighbor.
As people explore this new software package, thay can also take the Google Lunar X Prize tour. By simply downloading a file to their computer and opening it the new Google Earth, they “will be whisked away on a tour of the lunar surface with X Prize Founder Peter Diamandis and with X Prize Trustee and second generation astronaut Richard Garriott.
Download Google Lunar X Prize tour for Google Earth here: http://www.googlelunarxprize.org/files/kml/Google_Lunar_X_PRIZE_Tour.kmz (more…)
New Focus on the Moon
This Locator Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter Camera's Narrow Angle Camera image shows the position of the first two images. This image is 253x1000 pixels or 3,542 meters (2.2 miles) wide by 14,000 meters (8.7 miles) long. (NASA/GSFC/Arizona State University)
NASA’s Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter Camera (LROC) has taken and received its first images of the Moon, kicking off the year-long mapping mission of Earth’s nearest celestial neighbor. The LROC imaging system, under the watchful eyes of Arizona State University professor Mark Robison, the principal investigator, consists of two Narrow Angle Cameras (NACs) to provide high-resolution black-and-white images, a Wide Angle Camera (WAC) to provide images in seven color bands over a 60-kilometer (37.28-mile) swath, and a Sequence and Compressor System (SCS) supporting data acquisition for both cameras.
NASA reports that the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter, which launched June 18, is performing exceptionally well and spacecraft checkout is proceeding smoothly, so smoothly in fact that LROC was given an early, but short (two orbits) opportunity Tuesday evening to measure temperatures and background values while imaging. Since LRO is in a terminator orbit, much of the area photographed was in shadows, which is actually a good situation for performing engineering checks of camera settings, according to Robinson, with ASU’s School of Earth and Space Exploration. Much to the delight of the LROC team, a few of the images captured dramatic views of the surface.
“Our first images were taken along the Moon’s terminator – the dividing line between day and night – making us initially unsure of how they would turn out,” says Robinson. “Because of the deep shadowing, subtle topography is exaggerated suggesting a craggy and inhospitable surface. In reality, the area is similar to the region where the Apollo 16 astronauts comfortably explored in 1972. Though these images are magnificent in their own right, the main message is that LROC is nearly ready to begin its mission.”
LROC NAC: Two details from one of the first images
LRO was 70 kilometers (43.5 miles) above the lunar surface when the summed mode image was taken, resulting in a resolution of approximately 1.4-meters/pixel (34.4°S, 6.0°W). Incredible levels of detail are visible in these two (1000 pixel-by-1000 pixel) cutouts from the full image (2532 pixels-by-53,248 pixels). The NAC data shown has not been calibrated, and the pixel values were stretched to enhance contrast.
Along the terminator, there simply is not much light – the instrument is “photon-starved,” resulting in suboptimal signal-to-noise ratios. Without summing, images taken in this circumstance would be underexposed. To compensate for low light levels, the pixels can effectively be made larger by summing adjacent pixels to increase the signal-to-noise ratio, making the image sharper, though with 2x lower resolution. At this resolution, features as small as three meters (9.8 feet) wide can be discerned. (more…)
NASA Lunar Mission Successfully Enters Moon Orbit
An artist's concept of the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter with an image of Earth in the background. (NASA)
After a four and a half day journey from the Earth, the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter, or LRO, has successfully entered orbit around the moon. Engineers at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md., confirmed the spacecraft’s lunar orbit insertion at 6:27 a.m. EDT Tuesday.
During transit to the moon, engineers performed a mid-course correction to get the spacecraft in the proper position to reach its lunar destination. Since the moon is always moving, the spacecraft shot for a target point ahead of the moon. When close to the moon, LRO used its rocket motor to slow down until the gravity of the moon caught the spacecraft in lunar orbit. (more…)
Return to the Moon
Enroute to Launch Complex 41 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida, NASA's LRO and LCROSS spacecrafts move past the Vehicle Assembly Building at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida. (NASA/Dimitri Gerondidakis)
The Interdisciplinary A building on the Arizona State University Tempe campus looks rather average from the outside. There isn’t anything that hints at the excitement, talent and innovation hidden behind its nondescript doors, and there is certainly no indication that the first steps of a great journey are taking place inside.
For nearly two years, professor Mark Robinson and his team have called this building home, developing it into a state-of-the-art Science Operations Center (referred to as the SOC) to work in conjunction with their contribution to the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO). The instrument payload of LRO consists of seven scientific instruments from institutions around the nation and globe that will return lunar imagery, topography, temperatures, and more. Robinson is Principal Investigator of one of the instruments on board, the imaging system known as LROC (short for Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter Camera). (more…)
Student Design to Protect Lunar Outpost from Dangerous Radiation
In an artist's conception, astronauts enter a preliminary lunar base. On December 4, 2006, NASA announced plans to establish a polar outpost on the moon, which would eventually serve as a launching site for Mars missions. (Illustration courtesy NASA)
Alien creatures are the least of NASA’s worries when it comes to moon travel. There are several potential threats to future missions – with space radiation at the top of the list. Now, a group of students at North Carolina State University has developed a “blanket” of sorts that covers lunar outposts – the astronauts’ living quarters – to provide astronauts protection against radiation while also generating and storing power.
Astronauts who previously traveled to the moon had little protection against radiation, but were only exposed to it for a short amount of time. NASA’s plans to return astronauts to the moon by 2020 – and to potentially keep them there for several months at a time – could be stymied by space radiation. (more…)
After 40 Years, Determined Scientist Unravels the Physics of Hazardous Lunar Dust
Buzz Aldrin on the Moon with footprints in the dust. (NASA)
In the 1960s and 1970s, the Apollo Moon Program struggled with a minuscule, yet formidable enemy: sticky lunar dust. Four decades later, a new study reveals that forces compelling lunar dust to cling to surfaces — ruining scientific experiments and endangering astronauts’ health —change during the lunar day with the elevation of the sun.
The study analyzes the interactions on the Moon among electrostatic adhesive forces, the angle of incidence of the sun’s rays, and lunar gravity. It concludes that the stickiness of lunar dust on a vertical surface changes as the sun moves higher in the sky, eventually allowing the very weak lunar gravity to pull the dust off.
The study has been accepted for publication in Geophysical Research Letters, a publication of the American Geophysical Union (AGU.) (more…)
Robots Could Prepare Lunar Landing Pad
Small excavation robots, such as these conceptual vehicles, would be capable of preparing lunar landing sites for a future outpost, a new study shows. (Credit: Astrobotic Technology Inc.)
Small robots the size of riding mowers could prepare a safe landing site for NASA’s Moon outpost, according to a NASA-sponsored study prepared by Astrobotic Technology Inc. with technical assistance from Carnegie Mellon University’s Robotics Institute.
Astrobotic Technology and Carnegie Mellon researchers analyzed mission requirements and developed the design for an innovative new type of small lunar robot under contract from NASA’s Lunar Surface Systems group. (more…)
X-rays Map the Surface Composition of the Moon
Body of the Chandrayaan-1 spacecraft under construction at ISRO. Credit: ISRO
The C1XS X-ray camera, jointly developed by the UK’s STFC Rutherford Appleton Laboratory and the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO), has successfully detected its first X-ray signature from the Moon. This is the first step in its mission to reveal the origin and evolution of our Moon by mapping its surface composition.
In orbit around the Moon on the Chandrayaan-1 spacecraft, C1XS detected the X-ray signal from a region near the Apollo landing sites on December 12th 2008 at 02:36 UT. The solar flare that caused the X-ray fluorescence was exceedingly weak, approximately 20 times smaller than the minimum C1XS was designed to detect.
(more…)
Lunar Rock-Like Material May Someday House Moon Colonies
A composite of simulated lunar regolith and powdered aluminum heats up via wires as part of the fusion process that forms a brick. A team of Virginia Tech students designed the brick as a potential building tool for future colonies on the moon. ( Eric J. Faierson)
Dwellings in colonies on the moon one day may be built with new, highly durable bricks developed by students from the College of Engineering at Virginia Tech.
Initially designed to construct a dome, the building material is composed of a lunar rock-like material mixed with powdered aluminum that can be molded into any shape. The invention recently won the In-Situ Lunar Resource Utilization materials and construction category award from the Pacific International Space Center for Exploration Systems (PISCES). The award was one of two prizes given out this year by the research center, which is dedicated to supporting life on the moon and beyond. (more…)
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