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Discovery of Water In Moon May Alter Origin Theory
MarkWhittington writes "Scientists, working on a NASA grant, have made another startling discovery concerning water on the Moon. It seems that the interior of the Moon has far more water in it than previously thought — as much as the Earth does, apparently. Researchers made this discovery by examining samples of volcanic glass brought back to Earth by the Apollo 17 astronauts. These tiny beads of glass have about 750 parts per million of water in them: about the same amount as similar volcanic glass on Earth. It is postulated that more water than previously imagined exists deep below the lunar surface and was brought up and trapped in these crystalline beads by volcanic action billions of years ago." Phil Plait's original post adds more detail.
I am a FISH.
Source is a yahoo news story?
Since the accepted theory about the origin of the moon is that it is the result of a large body impacting Earth (I watch the Universe, no scientific background here at all), is it not possible that the samples that they're finding on the moon are part of the Earth transferred in the impact?
The Bible indicates that water was first and land formed from it. Its only natural to assume then that water would be a significant portion of any planet or moon.
Genesis 1:9
And God said, “Let the water under the sky be gathered to one place, and let dry ground appear.” And it was so.
Now we know why all the whalers went to the moon.
Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
I say we sent a giant moon diaper up there to collect the water.
Just nuke the damn moon and let's get done with it.
Grammar nazis are to this community what excrements are to gold.
Billions of year ago? How can that be? The earth is only 6000 years old, everyone knows that. DUH!
Just proves we never went to the moon!!! Samples back from Nevada or even Kilimanjaro could have been 'obtained'.
Sometimes reading less books increases knowledge.
Next time I am lost in a desert I will suck on my glass bead. What a thirst quencher. AH.
Or best offer. No undercover agents, pls.
"But when such technology is developed, lunar water could become the most valuable resource in the solar system, making the Moon the most desired real estate beyond the Earth."
Lunafina anyone?
This seems to be more evidence that water exists all over this part of the Solar System instead of Moon and Earth formed differently. In fact it would be kind of weird and probably be more supported of "separate formation" if we couldn't find water on the Moon.
Couldn't it be possible that the comet impacts created the water containing glass? A sufficiently large impact should melt some rock that may look lite it was brought up from inside the moon. The current theory is that water is deposited by comets; why not the glass too?
Chandramaava apaam pushpam... ... ..
Chandramaava apaam aayatam...
Aapovai Chandramasa aayatam.
Moon is the flower of water... ... ... ...
Water comes from the Moon..
And Moon comes from water...
I am a man of science but this one shloka blows my mind.
From TFA:
Lunar water can be mined then refined into liquid oxygen and liquid hydrogen. After that, it can be shot into space by a lunar-based rail gun to a fuel depot at one of the Lagrange points, where the gravity of the Moon and the Earth cancel one another out. A spacecraft headed, say, for Mars would not have to carry all the fuel it needs to get to Mars from the Earth, but rather stop at one of these fuel depots, top off its tanks, and proceed on.
Well, first we have to build a moon base from which to do the mining...
Aside from that, let's say you've escaped Earth's gravity well -- wouldn't it be better to not burn lots of fuel firing retro-rockets to stop and fill back up, and re-accelerate? What if the space base on the Moon used it's rail gun to launch the fuel on an intercept course -- you know, like when someone asks for some gas money for their car, and you toss them a Molotov cocktail and say "catch".
I'm sorry, what I mean to say is -- If we have Oxygen and Water refineries on the Moon Base, why not just launch the rocket from there (with their rail-gun) then fire thrusters and not have to stop at all?
Seriously though, at this far out point in our make-believe space future we're just one hypothetical step from having a clone farm manning the Moon base (cheaper than droids), but if the we don't get Kevin Spacey's voice samples for the robotic assistants, it just won't work.
I'm sorry, what I mean to say is -- Let's just start with getting people back to the Moon, or to Mars, an asteroid, hell anywhere other than our own orbit -- that's so routine that a space launch is about 20 seconds of local news. If you want space funding, you need to excite the general public about space.
Couldn't this be interpreted as additional evidence for the theory that the moon formed in a collision between earth and another object, in the sense that the moon once where part of earth and some water where transfered during the collision?
Rapture happened in 1981.
Mit der Dummheit kämpfen Götter selbst vergebens
Any chance of terrestrial contamination? Seems possible that over the last 4 years in storage, at some point the moon rocks in question could have been exposed to moisture from the Earth.
I fear there may be more to this story than meets the eye
http://www.weebls-stuff.com/onthemoon/On+The+Moon+ep.20/
so why does that mean there is that much water is on the moon now?
Is that the source of these volcanic beads was near a particularly large( for the moon) source of water. I am not an expert but this seems like a more reasonable guess than there is as much water on the moon as on earth. At least to a laymen
It's turtles _most_ of the way down.
Apollo 17 took place in 1972. Now please tell how come it took almost years to discover water? I mean, really, the thing was dripping close to 40 years and some Scientist (no doubt having many important degrees) claims that wet stuff is water. I believe if you ask the janitors who had to mop the wet floors could have told you that almost 40 years ago.
Ok, this was a shock too me when I first read this because there was huge amounts and still is of Lunar research going on and I can see the moon having some water tucked away in an impact crater...here and there in the shadows.
But the moon has the same amount of water content as the earth?
That is a _huge_ amount of water to miss for the pass 50 plus years of research.
It is a gigantic amount of water. They have done TONS of seismic studies of the moon and how is it possible that this has been missed?
WTF?
-Hack
Got Geometrodynamics? Awe, too hard to figure out? Too bad.
is it enough and easy enough to get to to make colonisation somewhat practical?
I guess the Saturday morning cartoons were not correct.
no comment
Seems to me, we should maybe go back to the moon.
I know Mars seem so much more interesting, but it's obvious we have a shit load more of learn from the moon, not to mention, if it has water inside, and it's easy to get at, would make colonies on the moon (for blasting off to mars and other locations) a lot more promising.
Be seeing you...
I'm stuck on the glass part of the article. It is pieces of glass, right? Pieces of what glass? Who's glass was it and what kind of glass was it? Hell, what kind of water was it? I'm mean was Neil having a spritz of water with a good bourbon or was it a gin and tonic. They need to be specific about these things. This is science they are talking about.
Having to work for a living is the root of all evil.
If it has the same ppm of water in the samples, then the amount of water in the moon would (theoretically) be proportional to the amount of water on the earth. Unless the moon is over half water, there is no way there is as much water as on earth. I'm not trying to be a pedant, but it seems like these articles are starting to spin out a bit.
Sometimes, life itself is sarcasm...
I thought that the accepted* origin of the moon was that it was created in 4004BC along with the earth.
(*) in the USA at least
NASA wants another "big" mission. A moon without recoverable water is a moon that will not support a moon base. NASA is eager to find water on the moon. They even crashed a large projectile into it a while back hoping to find evidence of water.
If there is reason to believe that the water was trapped as a result of volcanic activity, should we be looking for geodes under the surface?
What is clear to me is that the moon was placed where it is, orbiting the Earth like every other body we can identify in space, around 6000 years ago.
The sooner you scientists accept that, the sooner you can begin solving the really pressing problems facing us at the moment.
This is the release on NASA website: http://www.nasa.gov/home/hqnews/2011/may/HQ_11-171_Moon_Water.html
And here's the paper (requires subscription): http://www.sciencemag.org/content/early/2011/05/25/science.1204626.full.pdf
If nasa says, wanted, 50000 people for a moon city.
Then im sure a lot of people would apply to work on the moon.
Re apollo, people still cared, millions still watched the launches.
Its just NIXON was a fuked up retart who stopped it because the bankers fuked up usa due to inflation.
And if no one cares, then tuff titties, usa can go down inflames. And the moon will be one big china town.
Liberty freedom are no1, not dicks in suits.
You'd expect more of a open minded positive response and discussion from Slashdot on a story like this. Instead it seems like the lowest moderated article here comment wise as far as insightful comments.
Many have theorized the moon has much more life on the inside than the outside. This is huge news and almost a guarantee that there's life on the moon.
Yes I know that NASA has known this for years. Yes I know there's a secret space program and intelligence the government has about the true nature of reality. But if you've noticed lately, more and more news is slipping out to the mainstream media confirming life beyond Earth in the universe.
Hello Slashdot,
Yes its me again, periodically I say this on this august forum, but none seems to take heed.
Instead of dragging the rocket fuel up out of the earth's gravity well to reach escape velocity, set a plant up on the moon, to separate the water there into hydrogen and oxygen.
Fly a rocket from the earth to the moon, controlled from the earth, fuel the rocket from the moon.
Launch the moon fuelled rocket to towards the earth, start decelerating the rocket once it nears the earth
Fly something akin to Rutan's 'Spaceship one' to the vacuum of space carrying some very fragile and valuable human beings.
Hook the SS1 to the moon tug, light the blue touch paper and accelerate SS1 to escape velocity in the safety of the space vacuum 'coz relying on bathroom tiles is bad design.
Do it for Christa McAuliffe.
It's called an elephant's trunk whereas it is in fact, an elephant's nose, a nose by any other name would smell as sweet
There is water at the bottom of the ocean. Under the water, carry the water. On the moon.
"Stratigraphically the origin of agriculture and thermonuclear destruction will appear essentially simultaneous" -- Lee
The moon is made of cheese, as it is.
Up, Up, Down, Down, Left, Right, Left, Right, B, A, START
Water estimated on moon. It's also known the moon is hollow, as demonstrated when astronauts set up geophones and explosive detonators, establishing that the moon "rang like a bell" for hours after the explosion. At least two separate sample experiments were conducted, both agreeing. So, what's the likelihood there's a deep underground body of water on the moon? And is that where the dolphins went after they said thanks for all the fish? Also where the lunar Nazi colony gets its water? And was H.G Wells right? Boy, this is fun.
Who's glass was it and what kind of glass was it?
It was half empty and full of radioactive sludge. Brain the size of a planet and they leave me parking cars for a million years. Life, don't talk to me about life.
You are not a brain: http://books.google.com/books?id=2oV61CeDx-YC
Ummm... is it just me, or what the heck does the linked story have to do with the origins of life, other than the imagination of the author of this (slashdot) report of on it? Just sayin'... Here is a little clue: water != life... it is just one of the MANY thing necessary (like hundreds of criteria).
It amazes me that so many allegedly “educated” people have fallen so quickly and so hard for a fraudulent fabrication of such laughable proportions. The very idea that a gigantic ball of rock happens to orbit our planet, showing itself in neat, four-week cycles—with the same side facing us all the time—is ludicrous. Furthermore, it is an insult to common sense and a damnable affront to intellectual honesty and integrity. That people actually believe it is evidence that the liberals have wrested the last vestiges of control of our public school system from decent, God-fearing Americans (as if any further evidence was needed! Daddy’s Roommate? God Almighty!)
Documentaries such as Enemy of the State have accurately portrayed the elaborate, byzantine network of surveillance satellites that the liberals have sent into space to spy on law-abiding Americans. Equipped with technology developed by Handgun Control, Inc., these satellites have the ability to detect firearms from hundreds of kilometers up. That’s right, neighbors .. the next time you’re out in the backyard exercising your Second Amendment rights, the liberals will see it! These satellites are sensitive enough to tell the difference between a Colt .45 and a .38 Special! And when they detect you with a firearm, their computers cross-reference the address to figure out your name, and then an enormous database housed at Berkeley is updated with information about you.
Of course, this all works fine during the day, but what about at night? Even the liberals can’t control the rotation of the Earth to prevent nightfall from setting in (only Joshua was able to ask for that particular favor!) That’s where the “moon” comes in. Powered by nuclear reactors, the “moon” is nothing more than an enormous balloon, emitting trillions of candlepower of gun-revealing light. Piloted by key members of the liberal community, the “moon” is strategically moved across the country, pointing out those who dare to make use of their God-given rights at night!
Yes, I know this probably sounds paranoid and preposterous, but consider this. Despite what the revisionist historians tell you, there is no mention of the “moon” anywhere in literature or historical documents—anywhere—before 1950. That is when it was initially launched. When President Josef Kennedy, at the State of the Union address, proclaimed “We choose to go to the moon”, he may as well have said “We choose to go to the weather balloon.” The subsequent faking of a “moon” landing on national TV was the first step in a long history of the erosion of our constitutional rights by leftists in this country. No longer can we hide from our government when the sun goes down.