What is the secret of the moon?

What is the secret of the moon?

Image credit: pixabay.com

  If you see our solar system from the perspective of an extraterrestrial being, what you will notice, what will surprise you is nothing but our over sized moon. Without the moon, our planet will be a hell. There will be no seasons, no tides, and we will gradually become extinct. So from where did our moon come? 

According to "capture theory", where did the moon come from?

Image credit: en.wikipedia.com

  Our solar system didn't look the way earlier as it looks now. It was like a spiral disc surrounding around the sun and the disc had many rocky bodies which orbited the sun. And when the sun was born, the disc surrounding the sun got cleared. What left was only rocky bodies. These rocks came together and formed planets.

  A theory called as "capture theory" suggests that the moon was a planet formed from these rocks and soon the Earth's gravity captured it. The planet settles into an orbit around the Earth and becomes the moon that we see today. But science needs proofs to take a theory into reality. If the moon was a captured planet, then its composition might have been different than the Earth's. But when the Apollo astronauts brought back the sample of moons, scientists found out that the composition of Earth and the moon is almost the same. So the idea of the "capture theory" was out. There was no way that the moon was a captured planet.

According to "impact theory", where did the moon come from?

Image credit: pixabay.com

 Then scientists looked at the water content of the moon and imagined that a Mars sized object must have collided with the Earth and would have splashed a mass of debris from Earth ion the space. This debris gradually formed a ring around the Earth and soon the material of the Earth collided together to form the moon that we see today. The scientists named the planet as the planet Thea and this theory as the "Impact theory". It sounds weird but it solves many questions regarding the moon.

Why does the moon have dark patches?

  But then why does the moon have the dark patches that we see? It is not a man in the moon, nor a rabbit or a tree. It is actually solidified pools of lava that busted out years ago when it rained asteroids on moon.

Why do we see only one side of the moon?

  But strangely, from Earth, we see only one side of the moon which makes the far side a complete mystery. Although is known as the dark side of the moon, the sun actually does shine there but still we can't see it from earth. According to scientists, it rotates with the same speed with that it revolves around the earth. Tidal forces keep our planet and the moon in a balance gravitational harmony. This is called tidal locking. So on the moon one year is of around 27 days and one day is also of 27 days. This is the reason why we can see only one side of the moon in the sky from our vantage point.

Image credit: pixabay.com

How does the elusive side of the moon look like?

 But the Soviet Luna 3 took the photos of the elusive side of the moon and the scientists got shocked. We expected the far side to be as similar as the near side. But instead, it was cluttered and saturated with craters.  But why it happened that the craters on the side we see are filled with craters and the craters on the back side aren't? The answer was confirmed by recent NASA missions, that the thickness of crust was deeper (13 miles deeper) at the far side than the near side of the moon. As a result, the asteroids couldn't penetrate deep enough at the back side of the moon so that lava comes out. But why does the moon have this uneven crust?

Why does the moon have uneven crust? 

  This is kindly bizarre. But the possibly correct answer was found out only through super computing. It suggests that when the planet Thea collided on Earth, it gave rise to two different natural satellites. One was big and one was small which revolved slowly around Earth. Naturally, the smaller one collided with the bigger one slowly to form the present moon and as it was not a explosion, but a slow merging, the thickness of the far side of the crust increased.

  But not all scientists are convinced with this theory. And one of these scientists have found out another solution for the uneven crust of the moon. Koro 7B is an exoplanet which revolves a star. The planet is tidally locked with the star and thus only one side of the planet faces the star. But it is so close to the star that due to its proximity, the side facing the star has become a very hot pool of molten magma. Whereas the other side is very cold and saturated with craters due to no lava. Thus, some scientists think that when the Earth was very young, the same might have happened with the moon and that caused the difference between the two sides.

Is there still activity left on the moon?

  But Earth's crust is very cold today which makes it habitable. Still there is much activity left on the Earth which causes the volcanoes and all the endogenetic and exogenetic processes. Scientists have to solve one more mystery that is there any activity left on the moon? Since many years astronomers and scientists have reported bursts of light on the surface of the moon. Even the Apollo 11 astronomers saw them. But what are those? Does this mean that is there any geological activity left on the moon?

  Aristarchus crater in the northwest of the moon is a hotspot for such sightings. Even Neil Armstrong reported such bursts over here. These bursts could be the gases coming out or even lava. But this means that our moon could be alive!

What is the role of moon in leading life?

  But scientists have got another secret to reveal. moon is going away and away from the Earth each year. This is so less that it moves only 1 inch per year. But why is it going away? The moon creates tides on the Earth by attracting the oceans towards it, and as the Earth spins, this bulge of tides come on the land. 4.4 billion years ago, these tides would have been massive and it could have formed little lagoons where the nutrients and organic matter concentrated and probably led to life. This wouldn't be the case if we had small moons as we won't have huge tides then.

  But not only tides, the moon also held the Earth in its place and stabilized the Earth's axial tilt. This kept the seasons stabilized even after years. The devastating effects of the absence of such a moon can be seen on Mars. Scientists believe that such a binary pair of a natural satellite and a planet are the keys to find extraterrestrial life. And even though we find such exoplanets, we would want a cheaper route to those planets. And the moon will be one of them.

Will moon be our next space station?

  Yes! Satellite launches on Earth are so challenging and expensive because of the gravity and the atmosphere of Earth. Moon has a very low gravity and atmospheric pressure which can make lunar launches easy and cheaper. But the biggest challenge is to keep the ground crew alive on moon.

  The moon doesn't have a magnetic field. This can destroy the astronauts on the surface by the harmful solar winds and the cosmic rays and even the harmful radiation which comes from outside the solar system. Incoming space rocks will also make their life difficult on the lunar surface. Even a rock of a pea size will destroy the lunar base as they move with speed 10 times faster than a bullet. This is because there is almost no atmosphere to stop these particles. Moreover thew temperature swings can also be fatal as there can be a difference of 400 degrees in areas with and without sunlight. Thus living underground can be an amazing solution.

  Future astronauts won't need to dig a hole for that. Recent studies suggest that there is a hole on the top of a lunar lava tube. These tubes were formed due to volcanic activity. We can see many of them on Earth and there is one on the moon. The hole is as big as a football ground. These holes, called as skylights, leads to massive cave systems underground. So that can be the home for future astronauts. Astronauts could seal themselves insides these tubes by airlocks and can maintain a habitable temperature. This means that sealed tunnel without spacesuits.

  There is also water on the moon that can be used for drinking or for launching satellites by separating hydrogen and breathable oxygen. There are tons and tons of water in ice form in the craters. So moon can be our next space base.

Will moon always be there?

  But moon won't always be there. Yes! The moon is moving away from the Earth at a very low speed (1 inch per year). And this is because of the interaction of the Earth's and moon's tidal bulge. The bulge of water pulled up by gravity of the moon sits slightly ahead of the moon. This is because the Earth spins faster than the moon revolves around the Earth. For exact tidal locking, the moon would appear only from half of the Earth for all the time. This will only happen if the Earth slows down. And indeed, to compensate this, the Earth has been slowed down by the moon. But as the moon's gravity is weaker than the Earth's, the moon goes away to compensate this. Soon the moon will freeze at a point from the Earth and they will move in a lockstep.

  But then solar winds will again drag the moon in a trajectory towards the Earth in a spiral manner. And as the moon will come closer and closer to the Earth, it will explode due to gravity and tidal forces. This will form a Saturn like ring around the Earth of the moon debris. This will be spectacular to watch. But this beautiful ring will soon start to shower the debris on the Earth and the Earth would be a hell. The moon and Earth would come together again and will form a new world. A new sterile world with no living things round there.

Conclusion:

  Moon, our closest neighbor, still holds many secrets that are yet to be revealed. Humans don't know about the moon right from its origin. Still, theories suggest that it is the remnant of a huge collision or it is a small captured planet. It had pools of lava once, that led to the dark patches on it. Studies have proven that life wouldn't have existed on Earth without moon. The moon also has uneven crust and that is what scientists still are figuring out. Possibilities are that moon might be our next space station which will help the mankind to explore more about space. And the moon that has helped us a lot will only kill us. The moon gave us life and it is the one which will take it away...

  Conclusively, moon still holds many secrets that are yet to be figured out by the mankind.

Posts before October 2021 have been marked as "Old Posts". Less likely, but they might have out dated or incorrect information, ugly looking bits of code, no labels, etc. Don't get me wrong, many of these posts are top-notch and interesting too.

I thought it would be better not to delete or revamp these posts, even if they suck. The bitter truth is that old works always suck, but I take that as a positive tool to convey that I am growing. Besides there's no better way to showcase my journey without these old, messy, poorly written posts!

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