The Chang’e 5 mission, undertaken by the China National Space Administration, has identified two unpublished minerals in the lunar terrain. This discovery, the seventh and eighth of its kind, includes forms of rutile (TiO2), specifically Ti2O in trigonal and triclinic configurations.
The detection of unique minerals on the Moon
The uniqueness of these compounds lies in their non-existence in natural terrestrial samples to date. This translates to the unexplored richness of the earth’s large satellite. Some of the minerals were detected in glass microspheres on the lunar surface, and are scheduled to be returned to Earth, with important samples from the space mission mission in 2020.
Researchers from the Guiyang Institute of Geochemistry, together with collaborators from Guangzhou and Macau, shared these findings in ‘Nature Astronomy’. As they explain, the formation of these minerals probably occurred through an intense process of vaporization and subsequent deposition, triggered by the constant bombardment of micrometeorites against the lunar surface.
This process generated an amount of energy, sufficient to melt and vaporize nearby materials. As the vapor cooled and condensed, the minerals now identified formed, suggesting that the accumulation of space debris on the Moon may be a contributing factor.
The contribution of the Chang’e 5 mission
Micrometeorite impacts, besides modifying the lunar landscape, are critical points in the study of weathering in celestial bodies without atmosphere, such as Mercury and asteroids, providing valuable samples for the study of these processes.
This discovery was based on the analysis of 25 glass microspheres, which were examined using advanced transmission electron microscopy techniques. The detection of an impact crater in one of these microspheres revealed the presence of the new minerals, adding to the list of lunar minerals previously discovered by the U.S. Apollo, Russian Luna , and Chinese Chang’e 5 missions.
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Source: SCMP
Photo: Shutterstock
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