If we plan to send humans to the moon for longer stays than a few days, we will need to find efficient ways to produce the resources they need to live there. A key resource is water, and finding a convenient source of water on the moon has become a key topic of interest among space agencies in recent years. The good news is that there appears to be water ice at the Moon’s poles, and there could also be ice deposits in the craters near the poles. And in 2020 NASA announced a major finding that water had been detected on the surface illuminated by the Moon’s sun, providing a potentially valuable resource.
Now, researchers at the University of Colorado Boulder have discovered that there may be thick sheets of ice on the moon, created by ancient volcanoes. Although the moon is volcanically inactive today, it has been very active in earlier periods of its history. The team used computer modeling to simulate the ancient moon and found that this volcanic activity could have released large amounts of water vapor, which then settled to the surface and froze in deposits that could still to be there today.
Scientists believe that the Schroeter Valley as a moon snake was created by lava flowing to the surface. Johnson of NASA
“We imagine it as a frost on the moon that has accumulated over time,” Andrew Wilcoski, lead author of the new study, said in a statement. Therefore, there could be ice deposits below the surface of the moon and also in craters. “You may have large sheets of ice 5 or 10 feet below the surface,” said co-author Paul Hayne.
Some of these same researchers previously found that there could be much more water ice on the Moon than previously thought, hidden in small patches that remain in permanent darkness and are not exposed to sunlight. But they weren’t sure where this ice could come from. The answer could be the dramatic volcanic eruptions that peaked on the Moon between 3 and 4 billion years ago and left marks that we still see today, such as the valley formations created by the lava that moves through the surface afterwards. of being expelled. The volcanoes are said to have released water vapor and carbon dioxide, as well as lava.
This work is based, however, on models, so to find out if there are substantial amounts of ice we really have to go look for it. This is what NASA plans to do with its VIPER lunar rover and its challenge to develop technologies for drilling ice on the moon. To detect this resource, Wilcoski said, “We really need to dig deeper and look for it.”
The research is published in The Planetary Science Journal.
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