CNN Indonesia
Monday, 24 Jul 2023 19:10 WIB
Hot plumes on the far side of the Moon were tracked. (NASA/ARC/MIT Archives)
Jakarta, CNNIndonesia —
Scientist found a big hot blob on the far side Moon which is relatively rare found outside the Earth. What phenomenon is this?
The new study suggests the hot plumes may be caused by natural radiation emanating from buried granite boulders, which are rarely found in large quantities outside Earth.
The pile of material is most likely the result of a volcano that has been dead and has not erupted for 3.5 billion years.
“It’s more Earth-like than we imagined could be produced on the Moon, which had no water and plate tectonics that helped form Earth’s granite,” said Matt Siegler, lead author of the study from the Planetary Science Institute in Tucson, Arizona, in a statement. statement.
Siegler and his colleague Rita Economos of Southern Methodist University discovered this heat with a new method that uses microwaves to measure subsurface temperatures via the orbiters of the Chinese moons Chang’E 1 and 2.
They also used data from the Lunar Prospector and Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter of the United States Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA).
What they found was an area 50 kilometers across that was about 10 degrees Celsius warmer than the surroundings. This region lies beneath a point 20 kilometers in diameter on the silicon-rich surface and is thought to be a collapsing volcanic crater.
The extinct volcano last erupted 3.5 billion years ago, but magma from its water pipe system is likely still beneath the surface emitting radiation.
“This find is a batholith 50 km wide; batholith is a type of volcanic rock that forms when lava rises into the earth’s crust but does not erupt to the surface,” said Economos, quoted from LiveScience.
(lom/arh)
2023-07-24 12:10:51
#Mystery #Huge #Hot #Lump #Side #Moon #Revealed
