Scientists, studying pieces of rock brought by astronauts, found that the Moon formed about 4.6 billion years ago, when one small planet crashed into the early Earth and broke up into millions of fragments. But is this really so, and what other secrets does the lunar surface hide - read in this article.

The Moon is the fifth largest satellite in the solar system, the second in density, and the only satellite of our planet. It is the brightest object in our sky after the Sun, although the lunar surface is dark and looks more like coal. The fame of these facts since ancient times has made the Moon an important cultural object for study, art and mythology.

Origin of the satellite

Any theory explaining the origin of the Moon must explain the following facts:

The low density of the Moon shows that it does not have a heavy iron core like the Earth.
There are completely different minerals on the Moon and on Earth.
There is no such high concentration of iron on the Moon as on Earth.
The satellite has uranium 236 and neptunium 237, which are not found on our planet.
The relative abundances of oxygen isotopes on Earth and the Moon are identical, suggesting that the two planets were created at the same distance from the Sun.

Given all these subtleties, scientists today put forward three theories of the formation of the moon. All these hypotheses cannot be discounted.

division theory. This theory suggests that the Moon was once part of the Earth and somehow separated from it at the very beginning of the history of the solar system. The most popular version of the place where the moon originated is the Pacific Ocean basin. This theory would be considered possible if not for a few BUT .. Firstly, in this case, the Earth could separate the Moon from the outer layers. Secondly, these two planets must have the same fossils. And this is not so.

Theory of Capture. This theory implies that the Moon originated somewhere else on the solar planet and only then was captured by the Earth's gravitational field. This would explain the difference in the chemical composition of the two planets. However, in reality, the Earth's orbit could capture the Moon only if the satellite slowed down for several hours at the right time. Scientists do not want to believe in such "fine tuning". Yes, and there is no definite evidence for this theory.

Condensate Theory suggests that the Moon formed from the condensate of the Solar System in Earth's orbit. However, if this is the case, the satellite should have almost the same composition, including the iron core. This is not.

There is another theory that scientists today accept as the only correct one. This is the giant impact theory. In the mid-1970s, scientists proposed a new scenario for the formation of the moon. In their opinion, 4.5 billion years ago, a planetesimal (minor planet) crashed into the Earth just starting its formation and immediately broke up into several parts. It was from these fragments that the Moon was later formed.

Be that as it may, scientists have to do a lot of work to fully confirm or refute a particular theory. I think this will take a long time. But now representatives of science have found the answer to another question related to the Earth's satellite. There he is.

Is there water on the moon?

Three space satellites have confirmed that there is water on the satellite. It is not found in craters or underground, as previously thought. The data obtained show that water exists in a diffuse form over the entire surface of the Moon. Also, studies have shown that on the Moon there may be a cyclical nature of water - its molecules either break down or reappear.

This has nothing to do with ice sheets or frozen lakes: the amount of water in the area is not much greater than in a desert on Earth. But still it is more than previously thought. Recall that the moon was considered dry after the completion of the Apollo program. Then the astronauts brought with them samples of lunar rocks. Moon rocks were analyzed for water, and it was found.

Only scientists at the time believed that the water was of terrestrial origin, as several containers containing rocks leaked out. And only new studies have shown that there is still water on the moon. According to scientists, it can occur both on the lunar surface itself and in space, and then get to the satellite with the help of comets or the solar wind.

Scientists have no doubt that the lunar surface is much wetter than previously thought. They have no other doubts either. Namely, why one side of the Moon is not visible from Earth.

The cavity of one of the sides of the moon - myth or reality?

To explain why one side is constantly hidden from the human eye is actually quite simple. This is due to the fact that the rotation of the Moon around its axis coincides with the speed of rotation around the Earth. If the speed of its rotation were different, then we would see both sides of the lunar surface. Something else is interesting here.

In the early 1960s, some scientists claimed that the Moon was hollow. This belief was based on the data that the average cavity of the Earth's satellite is 3.34 grams per cm cubed, and the Earth's is 5.5 grams per cm cubed. Nobel chemist Dr. Harold Yuriy said that the main reason for the reduced density is the cavity of the moon. And Carl Sagan said: “A natural satellite cannot be a hollow object.” Is the Moon an artificial satellite?

Most probably not. Inside, the Moon has almost the same structure as the Earth - a crust, an upper and inner mantle, a molten outer core, and a crystalline inner core. At least that's what a NASA aerospace engineer, who has been studying this planet for over 15 years, thinks so.

Well-known scientists refute rumors about the cavity of the Moon, although, as you can see in the photo, it is far from being round. And they immediately talk about another topic that has been worrying them for many millennia.

Is there life on the moon?

One can immediately say that the astronauts who have visited the lunar surface believe that life in the form familiar to us cannot exist there. Since there are no necessary conditions for it. There is no atmosphere and, as a result, no air. There are no seas, no rivers, no oceans. Water itself is there, but it is present only in the form of molecules. The temperature ranges from -260 to +260 degrees. And more than half of the moon is occupied by a huge black lifeless desert, in which not a single living creature could survive.

However, there is also a discrepancy here. If there is no life on the Moon, then why have researchers themselves, for many decades now, claim to have seen strange objects on the lunar surface - pyramids and towers with a glass dome, unusual moving lights and other alien artifacts? And the photographs taken by satellites sent from the Earth confirm their words?

Is it correct to compare the physical properties of the Moon and the Earth? After all, life can arise anywhere. After all, that flower can bloom where it would seem that there are no conditions for its flowering. For example, in the desert, where it rains very rarely, and the heat exceeds all conceivable limits.

By the way, if now there is still no life on the Moon, then there is a chance that it will appear on it pretty soon. Indeed, already now many scientists are thinking about creating colonies-settlements there, in which people could live. According to scientists, this is necessary for a more accurate study of our nearest neighbor.

But it's not just scientists who care about the Moon. Since ancient times, ordinary people associate their lives with it. Having created a lunar calendar based on our observations of the lunar cycles, we try to stick to it. And how many myths and legends were created innumerable. And here are some of them.

Myths related to the moon

The moon is a powerful natural force. If you leave the house at night when the full moon is shining in the sky, you can understand how magical and amazing it is. People for a long time make the mysterious satellite of the Earth the central figure of many of their legends and myths, the most popular of them are:

Chang'e. There is a Chinese myth about a woman who lived on the moon. She and her husband were immortal beings until the gods got angry at their misbehavior and turned them into ordinary mortals by relocating them to Earth. Later, they tried again to become immortal with medicine, but Changye became too greedy and took more than she was supposed to. As a result, their flight ended long before the moon, they were simply stuck in time.

Selena/Moon. These are the names of the moon goddess in Greek and Roman mythology. In myths, she is most often associated with the sun god, traveling through the sky for a whole day. Selena is considered to be a passionate goddess capable of arousing passionate desires in people.

Werewolves. One of the creatures that we see in films and which is depicted in many myths and legends is the werewolf. This being is, of course, associated with the full moon. It is believed that these creatures have a human form during the day, but turns into a wolf as soon as the full moon comes.

Of course, these are far from all the legends and myths that are associated with the Moon. These are just small examples. After all, as you know, the companion of the Earth is associated not only with mystical stories, but is also a symbol of change, love, fertility, passion, violence and desire. The moon presents us with many mysteries. Will we ever find the answers to all the questions we have? As they say, we'll wait and see.

Until Friday, November 13, the Moon only reflected on the surface of the earth's water bodies - from puddles to the oceans, remaining itself dry and waterless, like the sands of the Sahara. But last Friday, scientists confidently proclaimed: "There is water on the moon!"

"Yes, we have found water on the Moon," said Anthony Calaprete, NASA's principal lunar crater explorer. "Not just a few drops of water, but a significant amount." Confirmation of scientists' guesses about the existence of water on the Moon was met with great enthusiasm by researchers who are going to organize a settlement of earthlings on its surface in the future. No less happy are those scientists who hope to find out the history of the solar system, preserved in the ice of the moon for billions of years.

The search for water on the moon was carried out with the help of a satellite. He crashed into a crater located near the south pole of the moon. This happened a month ago. The satellite flew into the crater at a speed of 9000 km per hour, formed a funnel 20-35 meters in size and threw at least 100 liters of water up. "We didn't just get water droplets. We practically 'tasted' it," said Peter Schultz, professor of geology at Brown University.

For more than a decade, scientists have guessed about the existence of water on the Moon in the form of ice at the bottom of cold lunar craters, where the sun's rays do not penetrate. The LCROSS mission consisted of two parts: an empty rocket that was supposed to hit the bottom of the Cabeus crater, 100 km wide and 3.2 km deep, and a small satellite that was supposed to determine the composition of the ejected soil. NASA experts, who sacrificed sleep so as not to miss the impact of the rocket on the crater on October 9, were disappointed. They did not see the artificial eruption of Cabeus. Even the most powerful telescopes on Earth, including those located at the Palomar Observatory in California, could not detect it. But LCROSS himself photographed the eruption, although some inaccuracy in the aiming made it impossible to see the details.

The conclusion about the presence of water was made on the basis of the change in the color of the soil that occurred after the missile hit. The changes were caused by water molecules absorbing light waves of a certain length. Scientists have also discovered a change in the spectrum associated with the appearance of hydroxyl - the OH group, "knocked out" from water molecules as a result of a rocket impact. In addition, molecules of carbon dioxide and sulfur, as well as methane and other compounds, were detected. "There are a wide variety of opportunities open to us," says Dr. Calaprete.

Cabeus crater, like other lunar craters located near its poles, is in constant darkness. The temperature at the bottom of the crater is minus 220 degrees Celsius. At this temperature, no chemical compounds can "get out" of the crater. NASA chief lunar scientist Michael Vargo says that "these craters are like dusty closets of the solar system."

The moon has long been considered dry and waterless. Then there were hints of the existence of ice at the bottom of its polar craters. Some hypotheses in this regard suggest the influence of comets or the appearance of water inside the Moon itself. "Now that, thanks to LCROSS, we already know for sure that there is water on the Moon, we can begin to solve other serious problems," said Gregory Delory of the University of California at Berkeley. According to him, the results of the LCROSS mission and other spacecraft "paint a surprisingly new picture of the Moon as by no means a dead world. In fact, the Moon can be very interesting and dynamic."

Indeed, if ice on the Moon is abundant, then it will not only provide water for future earthly settlers. Oxygen and hydrogen, which are part of the water, will make it possible to produce fuel for rockets, and oxygen is necessary for the breathing of astronauts. It's funny that we will mine this ice like ore or coal on Earth, arranging adits and faces. However, unfortunately, in the plans of NASA, the Moon now occupies a far from leading place. Astronauts who first visited the moon in 1972 will return to it only in 2020. But now this date is in question. A presidential panel set up in May concluded that NASA's budget cuts make the 2020 date unrealistic. The commission proposed to President Obama a different plan: forget about the moon and focus on exploring deep space with unmanned spacecraft.

Returning to the discovery of water on the Moon, it must be emphasized that the Moon is still far from a "wet" planet. It is possible that the soil of the Cabeus crater may turn out to be drier than the sands of terrestrial deserts. But, according to Dr. Calaprete, 100 liters of water is only the lower limit, and therefore it is too early to draw conclusions about the concentration of water in the soil of lunar craters. Who knows how many more years must pass before Aelita greets the astronauts with a glass of water.

Tracks of landslides and astronauts

Not only water was found on the Moon, but also manifestations of geological activity, which has always been considered impossible on this cold, "dead" celestial body. The American apparatus LRO ("Lunar Orbital Reconnaissance") saw on the surface of our satellite a landslide that descended on the Moon relatively recently by geological standards. It would seem that what could be the reason for the movement of the soil, because there are no water flows on the Moon, the wind does not blow and there is no rain?

However, even 15 years ago, an international team of researchers, including the Russian astronomer Vladislav Shevchenko, noted in photographs of the lunar surface areas in the crater Rainer, which differed significantly in color from the surrounding soil. They were much darker, as befits a landslide that had only recently slid down from the top of the crater. Estimated time for the formation of a landslide is from several years to 500 thousand years, but in any case, this is very short compared to the billions of years of the Moon's existence. This is a "young" landslide.

The hypothesis of geological activity on the satellite was confirmed by LRO, and this device saw landslides in another crater - Marinus, although it is still rather difficult to name the reason for their appearance. Most likely, landslides are the result of a meteor shower that caused moonquakes. In any case, the Moon does not appear to be as dead as it was 20 years ago.

The LRO apparatus has on its board cameras with a huge resolution of 50 centimeters, and with their help another discovery was made. More precisely, the closure is the closure of the theme of the hoax created by the American space agency. Until very recently, some outcasts seriously assured the public that the Americans were not on the moon. So, LRO photographed the Apollo lunar landing sites with footprints and even astronaut footprints. However, the outcasts will now surely say that the photos are faked...

Since that famous January night in 1610, when Galileo pointed his telescope to the sky and discovered the satellites of Jupiter, many scientists and enthusiasts have followed his example and discovered many planets and stars, the existence of which is not currently confirmed. And long before Galileo, inexplicable phenomena in space baffled thinkers and excited the minds of the townsfolk. Today, in the 21st century, despite the fact that modern science has advanced far, astronomy has accumulated a lot of discoveries and observations that require new theoretical constructions for their explanation. All of them, at first glance, seem extremely complex, but, given the experience of the past, scientists are in no hurry to retreat.

The next book in the series tells about the most exciting mysteries of modern astronomy.

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When we look at photographs taken by astronauts who have been on the moon, we see only a lifeless distance in front of us. Gray dust. dryness. For a long time, planetary scientists believed that the Moon was drier than any desert, that there was not a drop of water there. If it hit the lunar surface along with comets, it has long since evaporated and escaped into outer space, since in the daytime the lunar surface heats up to 130 ° C.

It was not until the 1990s that the longstanding dogma was shaken by facts. The spectrometer of one of the American probes recorded hydrogen over the poles of the Moon. Some scientists then suggested that at the bottom of the craters located in the vicinity of the poles, ice brought by comets could accumulate, because the sun's rays never look there. There is eternal night. So, the temperature at the bottom of the Hermite crater is -248 °C. Astronomers hypothesize that when ultraviolet radiation emitted by the Sun hits the ice piled up in these sinkholes, it rips hydrogen atoms out of water molecules. They were noticed by the spectrometer.

This hypothesis has met with many objections. But recent discoveries confirm it. Improved methods of analysis made it possible to discern in the "dead blocks" what scientists did not hope to find. Water traces. The stone ball of the Moon, powdered with dust, seemed to be breathed into life.

The most important experiment was carried out on October 9, 2009. The American LCROSS probe crashed into the Cabeus crater near the South Pole of the Moon. It was about a planned maneuver - about finding water in such an unusual way. If there were drops of water in a cloud of dust that swept over the planet, they would hardly have escaped the attention of astronomers.

A year later, detailed statistics of the experiment were released. According to Science magazine in October 2010, the floor of Cabeus crater is about 5.6% water ice. Among the 4-6 tons of material dispersed by the explosion, the instruments recorded approximately 155 kilograms of water vapor.

Where did the water on the moon come from? How often is it replenished? Is it just comets? A number of astronomers believe that some kind of precipitation falls here regularly. Here's how you can imagine it. Above the moon, almost devoid of atmosphere, the solar wind constantly blows. It brings here positively charged hydrogen ions. Combining with oxygen atoms contained in the lunar soil, they form water molecules, replenishing its reserves, which, obviously, are many on the Moon. However, in the spring of 2010, this process could not be reproduced under laboratory conditions. It seems that supporters of another hypothesis are gaining the upper hand, who believe that "microcomets" - dust particles soaked in ice - are constantly falling on the surface of the Moon.

There are more water reserves on the Moon than even optimists could have imagined. Very curious information was collected by the Indian probe Chandrayan-1, which went to the Moon in October 2008. In particular, he compiled a map of the minerals characteristic of the lunar surface.

So, in the polar regions and some other areas of the planet, minerals containing molecules of water and hydroxyl groups (H 2 O and OH) were found. Obviously, the lunar soil also contains water ice. This discovery was made at the end of 2009, but even then scientists cautiously assumed that the amount of water on the Moon is very small. “When we talk about water reserves on the Moon, we don’t mean seas or oceans, not even puddles,” said American astronomer Carl Peters. Not, we are talking about water molecules that are present in the upper layer of the lunar soil - a layer only a few millimeters thick. According to the initial estimate, in the rocks of the Moon, there was one molecule of water per billion other molecules.

An image of a lunar crater processed by NASA. The dark spots on the left side mark minerals that are thought to contain water.

A separate conversation is about the polar regions. Here we are dealing with real ice. In early 2010, while analyzing the data transmitted earlier by the Chandrayaan-1 probe, American scientists discovered huge reserves of water ice near the North Pole of the Moon. Ice has accumulated at the bottom of forty local craters, whose diameter is from 1.6 to 15 kilometers. According to scientists, we can talk about 600 million tons of ice. Obviously, it is from the polar regions that the development of the first planet accessible to us in the boundless outer space will begin. “Now we can say with a certain degree of certainty that people can stay on the moon for a long time,” commented one of its authors, American astronomer Paul Spudis, on this discovery.

A few months later, the journal PNAS (Proceedings of the National Academies of Sciences) published a report by Francis McCubbin and his colleagues from the Carnegie Institution. They analyzed samples of lunar rocks brought to Earth by American astronauts, participants in the Apollo program. From the article it was clear that the water on the moon is hundreds (and maybe thousands) times more than previously thought. Perhaps it is found everywhere, and its content is about 5 water molecules per million other molecules.

The attention of these researchers was attracted by apatites formed during the crystallization of magma ( long time after its formation, the moon was covered with a whole ocean of liquid magma). And since this process can only occur in the presence of water, scientists have suggested that there has always been water on the Moon - from its very birth. In this case, it also played an important role in the volcanic eruptions that raged on the Moon in the distant past. On Earth, when red-hot lava passes rocks containing water, it instantly evaporates, turning into steam, and then especially powerful eruptions are observed. Perhaps the same thing happened on the moon.

A significant drawback of this work is that its conclusions are based only on the analysis of ... two samples of lunar rock delivered to Earth. Opponents rightly point out that in order to determine the amount of water on the moon, you need to examine a much larger number of samples.

Soon a sharp rebuke followed from the pages of Science magazine. Scientists from the University of New Mexico at Albuquerque, in particular, geochemist Zachary Sharp, strongly rejected the conclusions of colleagues from the Carnegie Institution. From Sharpe's calculations it is clear that the hydrogen content in the lunar interior is about 10-100 thousand times lower than on Earth. Water is the product of the reaction of hydrogen with oxygen. No hydrogen, no water.

As for the traces of water that were discovered - several decades later! - in the samples delivered by the astronauts, their presence can be explained by the fact that the samples were already contaminated here when they were examined. So the impression was created that the bowels of the moon abound in water.

Particular skepticism was caused by the news that there was always water on the moon. Why didn't she turn into steam and fly away into space at the time of the rapid birth of the Moon - in a collision with the Earth of the sufferer-planet Theia? It is generally accepted that during that cosmic catastrophe all light and volatile elements, including water, evaporated. But maybe not all the water has evaporated? Or, over the many tens of millions of years that have passed since the first day of the creation of the Moon, the comets that fell on it in hail managed to deposit a lot of water - enough for our instruments to notice its traces?

It is worth adding that, no matter how pessimistic Sharpe is in his conclusions, he does not deny the obvious. There are reserves of water ice at the bottom of deep lunar craters, and they may be large. This water will become the most important resource for the future colonists of the Moon.

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Until now, it was believed that the Moon is an absolutely “dry” body both on the surface and inside, and has been so from the very moment of its origin (almost 4 billion years ago, the Earth collided with a cosmic body the size of Mars, as a result of which the Moon was born ).

If water existed at the earliest stages of the life of the moon, it had long since evaporated under the influence of the gigantic temperatures that arose during the collision, scientists believed. However, the latest discovery of American scientists casts doubt on this beautiful theory.

In the summer of 2008, a group of researchers led by Eric Hauri of the Carnegie Institution (USA) discovered water - or rather, traces of it - in samples of lunar volcanic material brought to Earth more than 30 years ago as part of the Apollo program.

The samples, which are about 3 billion years old, are small balls of volcanic glass. It was possible to detect traces of water in them - the smallest amounts of it - thanks to the method of secondary ion mass spectrometry (SIMS), developed by Dr. Howry. Compared with previous methods, sensitivity with SIMS has increased by 10 times, which allows you to detect faint traces of the desired substance, even if its content is less than 5 parts per million.

Studies have shown that volcanic lunar glass contains an unexpected amount of water - an average of 46 parts per million. The construction of a mathematical model for the cooling of samples (after they hit the surface) showed that the water content in hot magma before the eruption was 750 parts per million (for comparison: the earth's mantle contains from 500 to 1000 parts per million). In other words, in the early stages of the existence of the moon, a huge amount of water came to the surface from its bowels to the surface. However, 95% of this water was lost during the eruption.

According to scientists, part of the evaporated water went into outer space, and part settled back to the surface, and most of it was attributed to the poles of the moon. Only there, in unlit craters in the form of ice, can there be possible deposits of water (during a lunar day, the surface warms up to a temperature of over 100 degrees Celsius). It was previously believed that only comets and asteroids could serve as the source of ice at the poles of the Moon.

The discovery can turn over not only our understanding of the mechanics of the formation of the Moon, which, as is now clear, has contained water from its very birth, but also further prospects for its practical development. In November - December 2008, the launch of the American satellite LRO (Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter) is scheduled, which is supposed to check the south pole of the moon - to confirm or deny the presence of water there. If water is found on the Moon, it will make it easier to explore.

A month after sending the LCROSS probe, which crashed into the Cabeus crater near the Moon's South Pole, NASA announced that it has overwhelming evidence of "significant reserves" of water on the Moon. NASA scientists kept the results of this collision a secret, simply saying that the mission was a success and that they had obtained a lot of new spectrometric data. The impact caused by the probe raised a cloud of dust, which was captured on camera and analyzed for the presence of water (due to the fact that the crater is always located in the shadow of the Moon, the temperature here is much lower - about -220 ºC - and it is easier to study such clouds here ).

The scientists compared the known data on the radiation emitted by water and other materials in the infrared spectrum with those collected by the probe and found a match. According to Anthony Colaprete, the chief scientist of the project, no other substances could give this coincidence, and materials from Earth could not definitely get into the cloud. An additional confirmation was the subsequent isolation of the hydroxyl residue, a known product of the decomposition of water under the influence of UV rays.

But where did this water come from? Colaprete and his colleagues decided that water could come from many sources: solar winds (protons from the sun could have reacted with oxygen in the moon's soil), asteroids (which can contain varying amounts of water), comets (sometimes made up of 50% water), ice particles brought by intergalactic clouds. Due to the fact that hydrogen and water prevail in the universe, Colapreta believes that most likely there was more than one source.

The next big goal for scientists is to study this water in more detail. Future missions will take a sample from the crater and send it back to Earth for isotope analysis. Its isotopic composition (the ratio of the amounts of different isotopes) will help to find out its age, composition and origin. With data such as ice samples from Antarctica, scientists will be able to get close to studying climate change on the Moon by making comparisons with Earth.

Peter Schultz, professor of geology at Brown University and member of the LCROSS mission, thinks it might even be possible to use solar energy to power robots, landing pads and other tools that could perform analysis on the spot. To do this, the astronauts will need to land near the pole on the sunny side and install the necessary equipment that could be used by robots or people.

Two missions launching in 2011 and 2012 will help shed more light on this discovery. One of them will characterize the moon's atmosphere to determine what gases and how much it contains. The second will examine the lunar crust to assess its size and strength, as well as find areas where some scientists believe the moon is still volcanically active. What NASA scientists will discover in the coming years will remove the illusion of our knowledge of the moon's only moon, says Colaprete.

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