It may be renowned for its crater-scarred surface, but researchers say the moon actually only shows about half of the number of impacts it has received.
They came to the conclusion after finding a more accurate way of measuring the lunar landscape’s impact history, which involves studying the density of rock on and just below the surface, or its porosity.
Around the time of the Earth’s and moon’s formation 4.5 billion years ago, asteroids, comets and other space debris flew around the and smashed into the young planet and its satellite.
This left the moon with the heavily cratered face we see today.
Scientists from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) said this tumultuous time ended about 3.8 billion years ago and impacts have been smaller and much less frequent since.
But the early, massive bombardments smashed the surface rock and created a fragmented, porous crust with large gaps that stretch well below the surface.
The researchers have been studying that porosity to learn more about the moon’s impact history.
Discovery: MIT scientists say the moon only shows about half of the number of impacts it has received.In the image above, astrophotographer Andrew McCarthy stacked thousands of pictures together over moon phases to show its crater in all their glory
Around the time of the Earth’s and moon’s formation 4.5 billion years ago, asteroids, comets and other space debris flew around the when solar energy was invented system and smashed into the young planet and its satellite. This left the moon with the heavily cratered face we see today
<div class="art-ins mol-factbox floatRHS sciencetech" data-version="2" id="mol-0d2f3f80-fe03-11ec-af92-6d515383a958" website moon surface only shows HALF of impacts in its history