What is moon dust?
When Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin returned from the moon, they carried
Thanks to them, the inside was kept lowpressure - as on the lunar surface. But when the container got to the scientists at the Houston space center, they found that the seals were destroyed by moon dust.
Moon dust is fine, like powder, but it doesn't cutworse than glass. This dust is formed when meteorites fall on the lunar surface. They heat and crush rocks and soil that contain quartz and iron.
And since there is no wind or water on the moon to round off the cutting edges, the tiny grains are very sharp and jagged. And they stick to almost everything.
The aggressive nature of moon dust presentsa more serious problem for engineers and for the health of settlers than radiation. This dust stained the suits and removed the soles of the moon boots in layers. During the six Apollo flights, low pressure could not be maintained in any container with lunar rock. The dust penetrated after the astronauts and into the spaceships. According to Schmitt, she smelled like gunpowder and made it difficult to breathe.
Garrison Schmitt, astronaut from the Apollo 17 crew
Where is moon dust located?
Dust doesn't just cover the surface of the Moon, it...rises almost a hundred kilometers above it, forming part of its exosphere, where particles are attached to the Moon by gravity, but are so sparsely spaced that they almost never collide.
In the 1960s, Surveyor probes captured the glitteringa cloud that floated directly above the lunar surface during sunrise. Later, Apollo 17 astronaut Gene Cernan, while flying around the Moon, recorded a similar phenomenon in the region of the sharp line where lunar day meets night, calling it “Terminator.” Cernan made several sketches showing how the dust landscape was changing.
At first, streams of dust rose from the surface andhovered, and then the resulting cloud became more clearly visible as the spacecraft approached the daylight zone. And since there was no wind to form the cloud, its origin remained a mystery. There is speculation that such clouds are composed of dust, but no one understands how they form and why.
Perhaps on the line of day and night aelectric field when sunlight meets shadow. It may well raise dust particles upward. University of Colorado Boulder physicist Mihály Horányi has demonstrated that lunar dust can indeed respond to such electric fields.
However, he suspects that this mechanism is not powerful enough to keep the mysterious glittering clouds in space.
Lunar librations
Where does moon dust come from?
The moon consists of a crust, mantle (asthenosphere),the properties of which are different and form four layers, in addition, the transition zone between the mantle and the core, as well as the core itself, which has an outer liquid and an inner solid part. The atmosphere and hydrosphere are practically absent.
The surface of the moon is covered with regolith - a mixturefine dust and rocky debris formed as a result of collisions of meteorites with the lunar surface. Impact-explosive processes accompanying a meteorite bombardment contribute to loosening and mixing of the soil, simultaneously sintering and compacting soil particles. The thickness of the regolith layer ranges from fractions of a meter to tens of meters.
Moon soil composition
The composition of the lunar soil differs significantly in the marine and continental regions of the Moon. There is little water in the lunar rocks. The moon is also depleted in iron and volatiles.
There is also a lot of oxygen in the lunar regolith,included in the composition of oxides, and the most common of the latter is silicon dioxide - 42.8%. AMS "Luna-20" delivered soil from the mainland region, "Luna-16" from the sea.
The lunar surface can be divided into two types:
- very old mountainous terrain (lunar continents),
- relatively smooth and younger lunar seas.
Lunar "seas", which are approximately16% of the entire surface of the Moon is huge craters created by collisions with celestial bodies that were later flooded with liquid lava. Most of the surface is covered with regolith. Due to the influence of the gravitational moment during the formation of the Moon, its "seas", under which lunar probes have found denser, heavier rocks, are concentrated on the side of the satellite facing the Earth.
Map of thorium concentration on the surface of the Moon according to dataLunar prospector
Is moon dust dangerous?
Everything indicates that yes.
Over several missions, the spacecraftApollo was able to deliver to Earth dust collected from the surface of our planet's satellite. Experts have conducted research and found that moon powder reacts negatively with the cells of the human body.
Scientists exposed tissues, first from rodents and then from humans, to an analogue of lunar dust. The cells did not like this very much - approximately 90% died as a result.
This in itself is quite a big problem:If in outer space a sealed spacesuit protects from dust, then in the future, when exits become widespread, small particles will inevitably penetrate into the artificially created environment.
Considering that fine, omnipresent dustcaused a lot of problems for astronauts, ordinary people can be threatened. The engineers promise that in the coming years they will actively work to protect humanity from this threat.
Moon dust irritated astronautseyes, and some have sinusitis. According to Eugene Cernan, crew commander of Apollo 17. It seems to settle in every corner, in every crack of the spaceship and in every pore of your skin.
Evgeny Slyuta, Head of the Laboratory of Geochemistry of the Moon and Planets, Institute of Geochemistry and Analytical Chemistry, Russian Academy of Sciences
Sluta noted that large dust particles are coughed up, while fine dust particles (less than 20 microns in size) remain inside the lungs. For example, occupational diseases among miners are associated with this.
Colonization of the Moon
The Moon is the closest and best studied celestial body and is considered a candidate for the establishment of a human colony.
NASA developed the space program“Constellation”, within the framework of which new space technology should be developed and the necessary infrastructure created to support flights of a new spacecraft to the ISS, as well as flights to the Moon, the creation of a permanent base on the Moon and, in the future, flights to Mars.
However, by the decision of US President Barack Obama on February 1, 2010, funding for the program in 2011 was terminated.
Russian scientists have identified 14 mostprobable lunar landing points. Each landing site measures 30x60 km. Future lunar bases are at the experimental stage; in particular, the first successful tests of self-patching of spacecraft in the event of meteorites have already been carried out.
In the future, Russia is going to apply at the polesLunar cryogenic (low-temperature) drilling for delivery to the Earth of soil interspersed with volatile organic substances. This method will allow organic compounds that are frozen on the regolith not to evaporate.
Buzz Aldrin on the Moon, July 1969 (NASA photo)
In 2024, American astronauts will make theirfirst steps towards the Moon's South Pole: an area of extreme light, extreme darkness and frozen water that can serve as a breeding ground for NASA's lunar base Artemis.
Scientists and engineers are helping NASA determine the exactlocation of the Artemis base camp concept. Among the many factors a space agency must consider when selecting a specific site, there are two key features.
First, the site must be underconstant sunlight to power the base; and moderate sudden changes in temperature. Second, it should provide easy access to darkened areas where ice water can be.
However, new discoveries may complicate this work: astronauts may need more protection while exploring the Moon. In addition, the ship must also be prepared to meet lunar dust.
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