Water...at moon?

Finally, water has been discovered at the moon.

NASA spectrometers have discovered small amounts of hydroxyl (oxygen and hydrogen molecules) along with water molecules. Spectrometers or M3 have been studying the Moon’s surface since Cassini’s flyby in 1999. The strange thing here is that hen Cassini passed by, information was gathered and the data apparently showed what seemed to be water, but scientists did not want to take the risk and confirm that they’ve found water at the moon.

“NASA’s Moon Mineralogy Mapper, or M3, instrument reported the observations. M3 was carried into space on Oct. 22, 2008, aboard the Indian Space Research Organization’s Chandrayaan-1 spacecraft. Data from the Visual and Infrared Mapping Spectrometer, or VIMS, on NASA’s Cassini spacecraft, and the High-Resolution Infrared

Imaging Spectrometer on NASA’s Epoxi spacecraft contributed to confirmation of the finding. The spacecraft imaging spectrometers made it possible to map lunar water more effectively than ever before.” (NASA)

What these spectrometers do is quite simple. They measure the light reflected at the moon’s surface, then analyze it at infrared wavelengths. From that information gathered they can tell the surface composition, because different minerals or materials have different absorption rates of light. So what they discovered was that the data collected showed very similar patterns of absorption, compared to those of water. That´s how water and hydroxyl particles were discovered.

What´s next? We should keep on investigating, gathering more information, who knows, maybe in a very near future we could live at the moon.

Ignacio Morales