Thirsty Moon
(AKA: Holy Crap! A post!)
New research has all but buried the hope of finding water on the surface of the moon. Water, if it existed, would be of immense assistance to future astronauts attempting to set up and maintain permanent bases on the lunar surface.
The moon, as far is we know, is a dead and airless pile of rock. But, if a water rich comet struck the surface of the moon (and from the looks of the moon's battered face, I'd guess it safe to say that more than a few have) the comet would be pulverized an spread across the surface. In this way, water in some form could find its way onto the moon's barren landscape. Sadly, without an atmosphere to filter out the sun's intense heat, said water would all evaporate within a matter of minutes.
Someone had a brilliant idea. The floors of some crater at or near the poles are so deep that they never see daylight because the sun never rises enough above the horizon to illuminate them. In theory if any water found its way onto these crater floors, it could exist indefinitely.
It was a good theory and research seemed to back it up. Data returned from earthbound radar studies and from Clementine both showed the signature of water ice on the floors of a few craters at the moon's south pole. Scientists were giddy with delight.
This is science we're talking about and the scientific thing to do after a discover of this magnitude is this: rerun all of the experiments at a higher resolution to see if the findings still stand (it's good science and it's cheap). In this case they did not. New studies showed the alleged water ice signature not only on the crater floors, but on the openly sunlit surface as well, indicating that the signature is not from water but from something else entirely. And just that quickly, the hopes of the scientists, like those of a reader of a Steinbeck novel, were dashed.
I've never been super excited about this topic, but I've read a few discussion boards and it seems that a lot of people, scientists and laymen alike, are pretty broken up about new findings. Apparently they all stood poised, ready to begin drawing up plans for 2001: A Space Odyssey style moon bases and are now crestfallen that their plans have to wait. The moon bases that they had in mind would act as jumping off points for further manned trips to Mars, which is another topic I'm not thrilled about. But that discussion can wait for another day.
(AKA: Holy Crap! A post!)
New research has all but buried the hope of finding water on the surface of the moon. Water, if it existed, would be of immense assistance to future astronauts attempting to set up and maintain permanent bases on the lunar surface.
The moon, as far is we know, is a dead and airless pile of rock. But, if a water rich comet struck the surface of the moon (and from the looks of the moon's battered face, I'd guess it safe to say that more than a few have) the comet would be pulverized an spread across the surface. In this way, water in some form could find its way onto the moon's barren landscape. Sadly, without an atmosphere to filter out the sun's intense heat, said water would all evaporate within a matter of minutes.
Someone had a brilliant idea. The floors of some crater at or near the poles are so deep that they never see daylight because the sun never rises enough above the horizon to illuminate them. In theory if any water found its way onto these crater floors, it could exist indefinitely.
It was a good theory and research seemed to back it up. Data returned from earthbound radar studies and from Clementine both showed the signature of water ice on the floors of a few craters at the moon's south pole. Scientists were giddy with delight.
This is science we're talking about and the scientific thing to do after a discover of this magnitude is this: rerun all of the experiments at a higher resolution to see if the findings still stand (it's good science and it's cheap). In this case they did not. New studies showed the alleged water ice signature not only on the crater floors, but on the openly sunlit surface as well, indicating that the signature is not from water but from something else entirely. And just that quickly, the hopes of the scientists, like those of a reader of a Steinbeck novel, were dashed.
I've never been super excited about this topic, but I've read a few discussion boards and it seems that a lot of people, scientists and laymen alike, are pretty broken up about new findings. Apparently they all stood poised, ready to begin drawing up plans for 2001: A Space Odyssey style moon bases and are now crestfallen that their plans have to wait. The moon bases that they had in mind would act as jumping off points for further manned trips to Mars, which is another topic I'm not thrilled about. But that discussion can wait for another day.
posted by Pete at 9:26 AM
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