There Is Water On Moon Afterall

X-PASTER · 2009-09-24T18:21:33+00:00

Scientists: There Is Water On Moon Afterall Thursday September 24, 2009 Three space missions have found water particles on the Moon, newly-released documents have revealed. Diagram showing hydrogen ions carried from the Sun to Moon by solar wind Scientists had already established oxygen was present on the surface, but the latest probes have also found hydrogen, the other element required to make water. If lunar moisture could be produced in bigger quantities, it could mean space missions would be able process drinking water, create fuel and grow food. Until now, it was thought that the Moon is dry except for the possible presence of ice at the bottom of deep craters. Researchers analysed data collected by three probes which used Nasa equipment called M3 or the Moon Mineralogy Mapper. They believe reflected light waves recorded by India's first Moon mission, Chandrayyan-1, offer proof of chemical bonds between oxygen and hydrogen. The findings are backed up by data from two American probes. Lunar rocks found during Apollo missions in the 1960s also contain traces of water, the scientists found. It was previously assumed that the boxes were contaminated. "When we say 'water on the moon', we are not talking about lakes, oceans or even puddles," said Brown University's Carle Pieters, who worked on the review of the Indian data. "Water on the moon means molecules of water and hydroxyl (hydrogen and oxygen) that interact with molecules of rock and dust specifically in the top millimeters of the moon's surface." Full details of the findings by US researchers will be published in the journal Science on Friday. In a fortnight, a NASA mission will attempt to find water by deliberately crashing a craft onto the Moon's surface. SkyNews

Thread starter X-PASTER
Start date Sep 24, 2009

X-PASTER

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There Is Water On Moon Afterall

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