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| Wednesday / 28 June 2006 | ||
Future Moon
Missions May Solve Mysterious Lunar Swirls.
Lunar swirls are strange markings on
the Moon that resemble cream in coffee, but on a much larger scale.
They seem to be curly-cues of pale Moondust, twisting and turning
across the lunar surface. Each swirl is utterly flat and protected
by a magnetic field. Scientists do not know what they are; however,
a researcher who has been studying the phenomena for almost 40 years,
Bob Lin of University of California, Berkeley, has an interesting
theory. "Almost four billion years ago, the Moon had a liquid iron
core and a global magnetic field. Suppose an asteroid hit the Moon.
The blast would make a cloud of electrically conducting gas (plasma)
that would sweep around the Moon, pushing the global magnetic field
in front of it. Eventually, the cloud would converge at a point directly
opposite the impact, concentrating the magnetic field at that point,"
says Lin. Eons later, the Moon's core cooled and its global magnetic
field faded away. Only the strongest, tangled patches remained --
the swirls. However, scientists have found a swirl that is not directly
opposite an impact basin: Reiner Gamma (image). It is believed that
the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter, due to launch 15 October 2008,
will provide views of the swirls that will be breathtaking. Also,
the Moon Mineralogy Mapper on India's Chandrayaan-1 (launch in 2007
/ 2008) will survey the swirls. Scientists may get important clues
that will help them solve this mystery.
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