Moon marbles indicate the lunar depths

TThe lunar surface is complicated with the scars of asteroids who beat it for millennia. The heat generated by these cosmic collisions melted elongated rocks on the face of the moon. While the minerals of the melted rock were cooling and merged, they formed glass pearls. Now, a batch of such glass pearls recovered from lunar soil samples taken by the Moon Chang'e-5 mission from the National Space Chinese Administration in 2020 gives an overview of the mysterious interior of the celestial body.

An international team of researchers has analyzed the chemical composition of these balls and found that they contain unusual levels of magnesium, compared to the lunar glass beads previously studied. The team suggests that the high magnitude pearls were able to form when an asteroid slammed so hard in the moon that he melted deeply in his coat, which begins about 31 miles below the surface. If this is the case, the pearls would contain unprecedented information on the composition of the Moon mantle, which has never been directly sampled directly. THE results were published last week Scientific advances.

Huge craters on the surface of the moon, such as the $ 3 billion losses, could provide evidence of massive asteroid collisions, write the researchers. In fact, they report, remote sensing has determined that the edge of the basin contains a mineral profile similar to that of glass balls rich in magnesium.

Find out more about the deep geology of the moon could help scientists better understand how not only the moon but also the planets have formed over billions of years.

Image of lead: Olga_c / Shutterstock

• Bob Grant

  Published on May 16, 2025

  Bob Grant is the editor -in -chief of Nautilus.