We’ve come a long way from thinking the moon was made of cheese, but it looks like we still have a lot more to learn about this mysterious orb of night.
Recently it was discovered that the moon wasn’t just a big, dry mass but actually has water and something similar called hydroxyl buried under its surface!
Water is made up of two hydrogen atoms with one oxygen atom and hydroxyl only has one of each, but the moon has very little hydrogen. So, how is there water on the moon? Turns out, the sun has something to do with it!
The sun has solar winds which, scientists think, carry the hydrogen to the moon where it interacts with the existing oxygen and creates water and hydroxyl!
We think that’s pretty amazing!
DID YOU KNOW?
- The Moon is not spherical, but oval-shaped.
- Every year the Moon moves 1.6 inches further away from the Earth.
- The moon is 4.5 billion years old and there is a theory that it was created from pieces of Earth that were torn away when a huge object crashed into it.
- We only ever see one side of the Moon. The other side is called the “far side of the Moon.”
- Neil Armstrong was the first man to step foot on the moon and since him only 11others have done so.