Another team of skilled scientists found two novice crates. One of them reaches the age ranging 75-420 million years, while another one is pretty "young" for heavenly bodies - 16 million years. They were spotted in the darkest areas of the moon.
These crates are actually exciting and give additional information and evidence about the origin of the entire solar system. They shed more light upon the historical collision of our system. You can learn more details about these two important discoveries in the journal Icarus.
These discoveries were made with the help of the SwRI-developed Lyman-Alpha Mapping Project, which is briefly called LAMP. This is a universal instrument used on the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter, which is shortly named LRO. This instrument puts to the usage ultraviolet alpha lights. With their assistance, we can "see" the remotest areas of the moon even in the great shadows. With the help of these ultraviolet lights, the scholars were capable of projecting lunar maps of the distant regions of the southern pole. Those regions are also called the Dark Side of the Moon because the light of the sun cannot reach those areas directly. Due to this fact, only with the specially designed techniques the scholars saw the tiniest details of the southern pole and discovered those crates. In addition, this information allowed revealing an approximate age of the crates.
The studying of the planetary geology hugely assists in discovering the whole history of our system. This is an unbelievable and utterly beneficial method for the discovery of novel objects and determination of their age. When learning the age and origin of such objects, scholars will be able to answer many essential questions about the structure of our planet and the entire solar system. The science tries to detect and thoroughly examine all space collisions, which are the clue features of the solar system formation.
Of course, the studying of the moon is of great importance as well. The processes that happen on its surface do not undergo such alteration as on the Earth. We have different atmosphere and gravity. Any object that falls on the surface of our planet will be deformed and changed, while all the objects that fall on the moon will be undamaged.
The moon gives more facts about the ancient times. The scholars can determine approximate collisions and shifts of all objects of our system throughout the whole history of the universe in our part of the space. These crates all give additional data concerning the frequency of such collisions and creations.
How do the crates form? They appear as the result of collisions of small objects with the larger ones (just like the moon). The diameter of the crates varies. Some reach several miles, while the others may be only a few feet. A lot depends on the sizes of the crushing objects and their speed. Each collision creates a specific blanket of various materials around the crater. All the novel creations get influenced by the time. Weather conditions play the main role. Within time, all the crates get covered with novel layers of dust and other elements. At times, it is difficult to spot them. Thanks to the new techniques, this problem is resolved.
The scholars found out that the surrounding areas of these two crates are much brighter and rougher than in other parts of the moon. This means that they were formed later due to the crushing of some smaller objects with the surface of the moon. One of the crates is only 16 million years old. The other one may be 75 million years old, or 420 million years. Thanks to detailed analysis, the scholars examined the walls of the crates. This data gave topographic and surface features, as well as the properties of the created materials after the collision.
Thanks to the novice technologies, the scholars are going to investigate other unchecked regions of the moon. Probably, the science would be able to help in studying other planets and objects on greater distances. For instance, the scholars believe that this method would allow examining Mercury and a dwarf planet called Ceres and the asteroid Vesta.
