Our Moon continues to surprise us the more we study and explore our nearest neighbor. I have three news items as another story broke yesterday.
From NASA, "The science team that oversees the imaging system on board NASA’s Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) has released the highest resolutionnear-global topographic map of the Moon ever created.This new topographic map, from Arizona State University in Tempe, shows the surface shape and features over nearly the entire Moon with a pixel scale close to 100 meters (328 feet). A single measure ofelevation (one pixel) is about the size of two football fields placed side-by-side."
The highlands are the red hued areas while the lunar depths are blue hued. This is a remarkable map and achievement. Read More About It: http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/LRO/news/lro-topo.html
The Moon does not have an atmosphere but it does have an ionosphere which has baffled lunar scientists for decades. Now an answer to the mystery may have been found. Read More About It: http://science.nasa.gov/science-news/science-at-nasa/2011/14nov_lunarionosphere/
Finally, and related to the last news article, the Sun has been blasting away at the lunar surface, literally. Solar storms and associated activity could be eroding the lunar surface as well as the atmospheres of planets in our solar system. Read More About It: http://www.nasa.gov/topics/solarsystem/features/dream-cme.html
Sky Guy in VA
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