New Craters on the Moon Impact craters are important features of planetary bodies, as they are the m
New Craters on the Moon Impact craters are important features of planetary bodies, as they are the most dominant feature shaping their surfaces. Many planetary bodies are covered in them, such as Mercury and the Moon, while some show little signs of craters, such as Earth, due to active geological processes.For a while, it was thought that significant changes to the Moon’s surface took hundreds, maybe millions of years. The image above is one of many taken by the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) that shows that the Moon’s surface is changing, and much faster than previously thought.During the LRO mission, 222 impact craters have been identified from pairs of before and after images. These new craters, the largest being 43 meters in diameter, are spread across the Moon’s surface. Characteristics about these craters such as their size and the time between images can be used to determine the ages of various regions on the Moon’s surface. Image: Before and after of a new impact crater. (Credit: NASA/GSFC/Arizona State University) -- source link
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