It is not uncommon for the water to form on cosmic objects such as asteroids, comets, and moons. Water can be found in a variety of forms on these objects, including ice, vapor, and liquid.
The formation of water on cosmic objects depends on a number of factors, including the object’s location in the solar system, its composition, and its temperature. For example, water ice can be found on the surfaces of many asteroids and comets, as well as on the moons of outer planets like Jupiter and Saturn. Water vapor and other volatile substances can also be present in the atmospheres or interiors of some cosmic objects.
The idea of water on the Moon is not new
A recent study that ScienceAlert speaks about suggests that the water found on the Moon’s surface may have originated from the Sun. According to the research, which analyzed dust collected from the Moon, the water may have formed through a process called solar wind bombardment. This occurs when hydrogen ions from the solar wind collide with the lunar surface and react with mineral oxides, resulting in the creation of water molecules. It is believed that this water may be present in large quantities in the lunar regolith, particularly at mid and high latitudes on the Moon. This finding suggests that solar wind bombardment may be an important factor in the formation of water on the Moon.
Yangting Lin from the Chinese Academy of Sciences explained:
The polar lunar soils could contain more water than Chang’e-5 samples,
This discovery is of great significance for the future utilization of water resources on the Moon. Also, through particle sorting and heating, it is relatively easy to exploit and use the water contained in the lunar soil.
Water existing on our natural satellite doesn’t represent an entirely “exotic” idea. Water was first discovered on the Moon in September 2009, when the Moon Mineralogy Mapper (M3) instrument on board the Indian Chandrayaan-1 spacecraft detected water ice on the surface of the cosmic object. The M3 instrument used spectroscopy to identify the presence of water ice by analyzing the way that the ice absorbs and reflects light at different wavelengths.
The new study appears in PNAS.
