Tuesday, 2 July 2013

18

I'm taking this opportunity to return to the Moon, just because I found some awesome more scientific, information from this "astronomy for dummies" book i found.

The Moon is exactly 2,160 miles in diameter, the moon has nothing particular spectacular in its atmosphere; a bland combination of hydrogen, helium, neon, argon atoms, along with a few trace items. Its core is mostly rock, although some experts think it has a small molten iron core, and it has a mass of only 1/81 of the mass of earth, and it has a density of about 3.3 times that of earth.

It should be noted that aside from in a lunar eclipse, half the moon is always in sunlight and the other half always in night. A lunar eclipse occurs when a full moon is in line with the sun and the earth, where the moon is completely in the earth's shadow, 'the umbra'. Hence no light is reflected from the sun on the moon, because the earth in the way, simple. However when if you can recall the 'red moon eclipse' of December the 10th of 2011.

The way that works is that some of the light from the sun gets bent around the earth, red and orange mostly, still shines on the moon, which is reflects as usual, turning it red. The eclipse of the moon is as common as an eclipse of the sun; however the moon is more widely viewed when it does happen. This is because in an eclipse of the sun it is visible only along a band called 'the path of totality', whereas the earth's shadow falls across the moon, and all of that half that the moon has risen in can see it. (namely due to the small size of the moon in comparison to the sun.)

The moon has craters of every size across the whole of it, the largest of it is 'The South Pole Aitken Basin' that is around 1,600 miles across. These are caused by debris of the universe striking the surface, such as asteroids, meteorites and comets. Whereas the smaller craters that are have been found on the samples brought back from the moon exploration, are discovered to be caused by micrometeorites, the smaller rock particles that are found in space among the rest of the debris, essentially, the dust of the universe.

Although the moon has no volcanoes it has experienced some volcanism, this has occurred within the small volcanic domes or hills, which are connected with a variation of channels on top of the surface as lava tubes, called rilles. The moon has large lava pools that reside at the bottom of the larger impact basins, the craters, these are called maria, Latin for 'seas'. These were first mistaken for pools of water, in the early years, however if they were they would reflect light brighter, from the sun, just as water here is want to do.

The larger areas of brighter light from the moon are actually heavily cratered areas, called the lunar highlands. Whilst the maria have some craters, the highlands have far more per square mile, meaning that the maria are younger. This indicates that the large impacts that caused the maria removed the preexisting craters, with the lava flow removing any new craters that are formed. The craters that exist in the maria now are ones that have been formed after the lava froze.

The 'soil' that covers the moon, which in reality is just fine rock dust, comes from the numerous impacts of debris that have beaten against the moon over the ages. There have been traces of ice stuck to the dust particles in some cases (along with mercury and silver), these are commonly when the dust is pulled from the bottom of craters near the poles. Because the sun never reaches that height and thus the bottoms of said craters are shadowed, leaving these the coldest places on the moon, in one the south pole crater the temperature was below -400 degrees Fahrenheit.

The near side of the moon, will be visible when the sky is hazy or a little cloudy, and at most times it is visible even during the day, at which point you can see craters with even a small telescope, although with a larger more equipped one, there will be thousands of indentations on the moon; impact craters, maria, lunar highlands, rilles along with central peaks1, lunar mountains2, and rays3.

The 'dark side' of the moon, shows a dim glow, despite the sun not shining on it, the glow is called earthshine. It's like the red glow of the moon in an eclipse, earthshine is the sunlight that is absorbed into the earths atmosphere and projected back onto the moon, as the light is bent enough to land there. You will never see this effect on a full moon, although it is most commonly noted on a crescent moon. In fact in a full moon, you can barely see anything, due to the sun is high enough not cast many shadows, hence you can't really see any indentation on the surface of the moon.

To properly catalogue the moon, there are charts, just as there are for the stars, although due note they only show the one side of the moon, as you don't need one for the side you cannot see. The following site has a literal map of the moon that is interactive enough to see details, with alterations to when you are viewing available, Moon View, there are also a variety of books available if you are willing to look. There is also google moon, which is another interactive site, and I have also found the helpful guardian webpage wherein there is a report including some images of the original 1951 map of the moon created by H. Percy Wilkins (1896-1960), which can be see in detail at the National Museums Greenwich.
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1 - Central peaks surround some if not most craters, as they are the result of the displacement of the surface due to an impact.
2 - Lunar mountains are central peaks where the crater has been effected; either disguised or removed, and the peak has been left standing alone, hence mountain.
3 - Rays, are the term for the bright lines that blow outwards from a crater, these are made up of debris of the surface and the dust.

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