moon Archives - The Silver Ink

Colliosion with Earth’s twin sister Theia created the Moon

April 10, 2015 By Jeff Suchon 1 Comment

Moon formation was always a controversial issue with no sufficient information which can validate any claim.

It is long believed that the moon was formed by the collision between Earth and Theia which is a Mars like protoplanet.

The new study suggests that the planet Theia is similar to Earth in size and composition.

Hagai Perets, study co-author and astrophysicists at the Israel Institute of Technology in Haifa said, “The Earth and the moon are not twins born from the same planet, but they are sisters in the sense that they grew up in the same environment.”

It is known that the composition of Earth and Moon is very similar but the chances of Earth having a primordial twin are very less and is equal to none so there was a problem in understanding the formation of moon.

Alessandra Matrobuono-Batisti, lead author of the study said, “For some 30 years this contradiction was a major challenge to physicists grappling with the formation of the moon, the hope was that better simulations might resolve this issues, but it turned out that the progress with simulations gave essentially the same results, giving rise to the ‘isotope crisis,’ as this problem came to be called.”

The team used a newly developed computer model to analyze planetary collision possibilities. This new model simulates the early solar system which is full of would be planets around 85 to 90 planetary embryos and 1,000 to 2,000 planetesimals.

When the scientists started the simulation they realized collision and sibling formation are more common than previously believed.

Matrobuono-Batisti said, “On average, impactors are more similar to the planets they impact compared with different planets in the same system.”

A similar research showed that the sibling planet wouldn’t have had to be exactly the same in their composition.

Different model explained that how two differently composed planets could combine to form material boasting the same tungsten isotopic composition.

The result of the study shows that the early solar system was a violent place and it gives little more understanding about the Earth Moon relationship.

Both Earth and Moon formed of same material: Scientists

April 9, 2015 By Kyle Mills Leave a Comment

Putting light the formation of the Moon, a group of scientists from the University of Maryland generated a new isotope-based fingerprint of the Earth’s satellite suggesting that both our planet and its Moon were formed from the same alien body.

The isotopic fingerprint is the geological equivalent of a fingerprint of DNA.

So far, the astronomers and planetary science experts have believed that a massive body approximately the size of red planet ‘Mars’ struck and merged with the Earth within the first 150 million years of the formation of our solar system, triggering explosion of a huge cloud of debris and rock into the space.

According to the scientists, this cloud ultimately combined together and led to the formation of the Moon.

Richard Walker, study co-author and a geology professor, said, “Both Earth and Moon are very similar to each other with respect to their isotopic fingerprints. This suggests that they both are ultimately formed from the same material that gathered early in the history of our solar system.”

Walker called the findings surprising as the Mars-sized celestial body behind the creation of the Moon is likely to have been very different.

“So the conundrum is that both celestial bodies should not be as similar as they are,” he asserted.

The results support the idea that the mass of a material created due to the impact, which later led to the formation of the Moon, should have mixed together wholly before the Earth’s satellite coalesced and cooled.

The study also rules out the idea that the red planet-sized body shared similar composition, or that it was the pre-impact Earth that led to the formation of the Moon.

Concluding the study, the research authors said, “The findings bring us a step closer to better understanding the close familial relationship between the Moon and the Earth. We still require to work out the details… However, it is clear that our early solar system was a very violent place.”

The findings of the study were published in the journal Nature.

Blood Moon Stuns skywatchers in USA

April 7, 2015 By Stephen Kenwright Leave a Comment

Century’s shortest lunar eclipse was on April 4. It is the third lunar eclipse in a series of four.

North America enjoyed the short treat.

Lunar eclipse happens when sun, earth and moon fall in a straight line with the same order.

Lunar eclipse generally occurs twice in a year but this is the third in a series four in a row.

At 3.16 a.m. the moon was slowly entering the Earth’s shadow.

The moon entered fully into the shadow of the earth at 4:58 a.m. Pacific Time starting a total lunar eclipse for about five minutes.

The moon appeared in red and orange hence the name blood moon. The light rays from the sun are scattered from the earth’s atmosphere giving the moon that orange, red appearance.

Skywatchers in the eastern half of the North America experienced partial eclipse.

People from Australia, New Zealand and west coast of U.S. experienced total eclipse.

The eclipse was not visible in Iceland, Africa, Middle East, Europe and Greenland.

India, Russia, China and South America could experience part of the event.

The next eclipse is expected on September 28.

Shortest ‘Blood Moon’ lunar eclipse thrills skygazers in US, Canada

April 4, 2015 By Carrie Davis Leave a Comment

The skygazers in the United States and Canada were greeted with a rare lunar eclipse, called the Blood Moon, before the sunrise on Saturday.

According to the space experts, the starting stages of the partial umbral eclipse low in the west were witnessed by the people in western South America and eastern North America. On the other hand, its ending stages in the east were visible from the middle Asia, including countries like India, Russia and China after sunset on Saturday (April 4).

The space enthusiasts also got the rare opportunity to view the Blood Moon eclipse in Australia, Japan and New Zealand. It was a real disappointment for the people in Africa, the Middle East, Europe, Iceland and Greenland who were not the lucky ones to have a glimpse of the rare lunar eclipse. The poor weather conditions in some parts of Australia also forced some to stay deprived of the Blood Moon event.

The sky gazers in west of the Mississippi were very fortunate as there were able to see the entire Blood Moon of a total eclipse. But in New York, only some of the surface of the eclipsed moon was visible.

Saturday’s Blood Moon, which marks the third in the series of four consecutive lunar eclipses, was the shortest lunar eclipse of the century as it lasted just for five minutes.

The initial two eclipses occurred in the months of April and September last year. The fourth moon event will took place on September 28.

If go by the record, the shortest total lunar eclipse was occurred in the year 1529. NASA astronomer Mitzi Adams said that the lunar eclipse lasted just one minute and 42 seconds.

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