Recent research indicates that volcanic activity on the moon persisted well beyond previous estimates, possibly continuing until about 120 million years ago. This finding is based on an analysis of three tiny glass beads collected from the moon’s surface by a Chinese spacecraft in 2020.
The chemical composition of these beads reveals that lunar volcanoes were active much more recently than scientists previously believed. Earlier analyses had suggested that volcanic activity on the moon had ceased approximately 2 billion years ago, with some estimates extending back to 4 billion years.
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The research, published in the journal Science, challenges the earlier understanding of the moon’s volcanic history. “It was a little bit unexpected,” said Julie Stopar, a senior staff scientist at the Lunar and Planetary Institute, who was not involved in the study.
The findings build on observations from NASA’s Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter, which in 2014 hinted at more recent volcanic activity. However, the glass beads provide the first physical evidence of this phenomenon, according to Stopar. She noted that further research is needed to fully confirm the origins of these beads.
The Chang’e 5 mission’s samples are the first lunar rocks returned to Earth since NASA’s Apollo missions and Soviet Union missions in the 1970s. Earlier this year, China also returned samples from the far side of the moon.
Study co-author He Yuyang from the Chinese Academy of Sciences emphasized the importance of this discovery, stating that it could offer insights into how long small planets and moons, including Earth, can remain volcanically active.
The researchers examined approximately 3,000 lunar glass beads, each smaller than a pinhead, and identified three with characteristics suggesting they originated from volcanic activity. These glass beads could form when molten droplets cool after a volcanic eruption or meteorite impact.
Despite the new findings, existing timelines suggested that the moon had cooled past the point of volcanic activity by the time frame proposed by this research. “It should inspire lots of other studies to try to understand how this could happen,” Stopar remarked.
This new evidence is expected to spur additional studies to explore the longevity of volcanic activity on the moon and similar celestial bodies.
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