aug 282013
 
Water on Moon's Surface Hints at Water Below

  NASA-funded lunar research has yielded evidence of water locked in mineral grains on the surface of the Moon from an unknown source deep beneath the surface. The Gibbous Moon (11 days old). Image Credit & Copyright: Robert Gendler  Using data from NASA’s Moon Mineralogy Mapper (M3) instrument aboard the Indian Space Research Organization’s Chandrayaan-1 spacecraft, scientists [continue reading]

apr 032013
 
Lunar Crater Contains Traces of Before it was Formed

  Large impacts on the Moon can form wide craters and turn surface rock liquid. Geophysicists once assumed that liquid rock would be homogenous when it cooled. Now researchers have found  evidence that pre-existing mineralogy can survive impact melt.    Pre-existing mineral deposits on the Moon (sinuous melt, above) survived impacts powerful enough to melt [continue reading]