Posted on 10/24/2023 10:39:43 AM PDT by Red Badger
Oct. 23 (UPI) -- Scientists now believe the moon could actually be around 40 million years older than initially believed, according to new research.
The finding comes after a group of researchers reexamined a collection of dust collected from the lunar surface and brought back to Earth in 1972, the last time astronauts visited the moon.
Scientists took an in-depth look at crystals embedded within the dust, which was returned to Earth as part of NASA's Apollo 17 mission.
Researchers believe a massive collision of debris with Earth led to the creation of the moon. That impact took place around 100 million years after the solar system's formation and led to a large concentration of material being propelled into the atmosphere, creating our planet's moon.
Initially molten hot, the energy from the collision cooled, allowing scientists to measure and calculate age based on analysis of the crystals in the lunar dust.
"Because we know how old these crystals are, they serve as an anchor for the lunar chronology," study co-author and University of Chicago professor Philipp Heck said in a statement.
The moon was initially thought to be around 4.42 billion years old.
Research, which also involved the University of Glasgow, now puts that age at approximately 4.46 billion years.
"These findings require pushing the timing of the solidification of the lunar crust to within at least the first 100 Myr of the formation of the solar system and provide a minimum age for the Giant Impact event that formed the Earth-Moon system," the study's authors wrote in their findings, published in the journal Geochemical Perspectives Letters.
"This age pushes back the age of the first preserved lunar crust by ∼40 [million years] and provides a minimum formation age for the moon within 110 [million years] after the formation of the solar system."
Through its Artemis Program, NASA hopes to return a team of astronauts to the moon in 2025.
Sure. 6,000 tops.
LED’s. (You realize that half the moon is illuminated at any moment.) The moon always has the same face towards the earth but rotates with respect to the sun. A solar day on the moon is the same duration as a lunar month on earth, 29.53 earth days. When the earth sees a full moon, the moon sees a new (dark) earth, and vice versa.
Science is a collection of facts, observations, measurements, and theories or hypothesis to explain what we are seeing.
Others have put the date at over 6 B years
Considering how much older the moon is... I’d say, it has held its shape quite well.
Still it’s bulging slightly around the middle.................
why does the moon on the left look like a peeled orange?
The moon on the right looks like a photo taken from a microscope. It looks very flat. One would expect the edges to show curvature.
These scientists seem to think they know the age of the moon with a lot more precision than I would have thought. Clearly, they have not been accurate in their estimates to date. I would think they might save themselves future embarrassment by being less precise when looking at things so far away in both time and space.
They write this stuff for each other. This is about publishing something.... anything. It makes them look like they are doing something. Then they argue with each other endlessly.
And you wonder why we dont trust you!
Thats just too big a margin of error. Oh, you made that up too, didnt you?
Yeah, just another “gotta push back the date to make our preconceived notions work” day at the office.
So what? More birthday candles required?
A rounding error or other flaw is unlikely. In the study, a new and more precise method was used to extract uranium and lead from crystals of zircon in Moon rocks. In essence, a laser was used to ablate the crystals, atom by atom, with each atom then measured as to weight in order to determine its element and isotope. The ratio of lead to uranium tells when the crystal was created, based on the known and unalterable slow radioactive decay of uranium into lead making for a reliable clock on a geologic scale.
Do we get some sort of refund?
Thanks for the revelation. (sarc.)
I’m not saying anything until I see the birth certificate ...
The original long form one ...
I thought the moon looked more grey.
I’ve done it too. :)
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