BicaraIndonesia.id – A new study reveals the surprising fact that days on Earth are slowly getting longer. The reason is the moon that is still moving away from the planet Earth.
Scientists discovered that as the moon moves away, the changing effect on the Earth causes a slowdown in the planet’s rotation and causes the length of the day to increase slightly. small
They estimate that a day on Earth could reach 25 hours. However, this process is estimated to take around 200 million years.
“When the moon moves away, the Earth is like a roller skater who spins and slows down when he stretches out his arms,” explained Stephen Meyers, a geoscientist from the University of Wisconsin-Madison , as reported from day by day on Tuesday 20 August 2024.
Currently, the Moon is about 238,000 miles from Earth and it takes about 27.3 days to complete one orbit around Earth.
However, previous research has shown that the moon is moving away at about 1.5 inches per year, meaning that the time it takes to orbit the Earth will be longer. At some point, the moon will reach a constant speed and will only be visible from one side of planet Earth.
For their research, Meyers and his colleagues reconstructed the long history of the Earth’s relationship with the Moon. They discovered that 1.4 billion years ago, a day on Earth only lasted about 18 hours.
To get that calculation, the researchers found a statistical method that connects the theory astronomy with geological observations to look back at the geological history of the Earth.
This research will allow scientists to reconstruct the deep history of the solar system. They concluded that days on Earth were shorter than billions of years ago because the moon was closer to Earth. As a result, the rotation of the Earth turned faster than it is now.
However, throughout Earth’s history, the moon has continued to move away in a process known as “Moon Decline”.
The Apollo astronauts successfully planted probes on the Moon that allowed scientists on Earth to shoot lasers at the surface of the Moon and measure how fast the Moon was shrinking.
As the moon slowly moves away, it causes the Earth’s rotation to slow down. The reason has to do with the moon’s influence on tides. The gravity of the moon orbiting the Earth pulls on the oceans to create tides and tides.
Friction between the seabed and moving water also pulls the water forward. As a result, the tidal wave moves slightly ahead of the moon’s orbit, which tries to pull the wave back.
This gradually slows the rotation of the Earth as the Moon gains energy, causing it to move into a higher orbit.
Other factors also affect the Earth’s rotation, including climate change. As global temperatures rise, polar ice is melting faster than ever and pouring water into the Earth’s oceans.
All that liquid water gradually moves from the Earth’s poles to the equator, where oceans extend to the moon and away. This causes the Earth to become wider in the middle, slowing its rotation further.
Although the changes are so small that people would not notice them, over millions of years, these small changes would add up and eventually add an extra hour to the Earth’s daily cycle. (*/B1)
2024-08-20 02:55:02
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