lunar highlands, about 30 times less abundant (~0.5% vs. ~15%). Highlands - They are the oldest part of the Moon's surface. The Highlands rocks are largely Anorthosite, which is a kind of igneous rock that forms when lava cools more slowly than in the case of basalts. Put a dude from the Iron Age in a time machine and whisk him to 2013 and he'd see the same pattern of light lunar highlands . The regolith can be over 15 meters thick on the lunar highlands, and up to 8 meters thick on the mare. The U.S. Navy has created a web page where you can find the moon phase for any day in years 1800-2199. They are smooth, flat plains with few craters. Mare Humboldtianum (Humboldt's Sea) . The surface overturn depths, ejecta . Unlike an ideal diffuser of a given reflectance, two lunar features that . These showed that the ancient lunar crust formed from rock that crystallized and floated to the top of a . Apollo 16 landed on the Moon at 8:23 p.m. Houston time on April 20, 1972 (April 21 at 2:23 UTC). He perceived the bright, rough lunar highlands, which were named after terrestrial mountain chains, and the darker lunar plains, or maria (Latin for seas), which were given fanciful names such as the Sea of Tranquility, Sea of Humors, and Sea of Clouds. Rocks from the maria are classified as basalts because they are crystalline, igneous rocks (texture) consisting mainly of pyroxene and plagioclase (mineralogy). Lunar highland areas include most of the farside and southern part of the nearside of the Moon. This becomes immediately evident when comparing the numbers of craters on the lunar highlands with those on the maria. Ancient Lunar Crust: Origin, Composition, and Implications THE BATTERED ASYMMETRIC MOON The Moon is lopsided. 2 in the Lunar maria have been published (e.g., [1] and references therein), but no comparable algorithm for the highlands has been forthcomimg. They are the same age as the highlands because both features were formed by the hardening of lava. cratered, light-colored regions are the lunar highlands and the smooth dark regions are lunar maria. a. This was produced by smaller meteorites/micrometeorites pulverizing the upper layers of the megaregolith. METHODS The Ti02 values used in this study are derived from a technique using the Clementine and Galileo reflectance data (Lucey et al., 193 . The dark material filling the Maria is actually dark, solidified lava from earlier periods of Lunar volcanism. The lunar highlands have more craters, so they are older than maria. Check out this video for a quick overview. These are large flows of basaltic lava that correspond to low-albedo surfaces covering nearly a third of the near side. The highlands are very old, about 4-4.5 billion years and thus, heavily cratered. The maria were formed by basaltic lava flows, mostly after the primary flux of meteorites that bombarded the high­ lands (Lick Observatory photograph). These impacts obliterated preexisting craters. Yet the radioactive dating of highland samples showed that they are only a little older than the maria, typically 4.2 billion years . Depths of Copernican craters on lunar maria and highlands. Except for rare felsites . Lunar Mare, Terminator, and Craters. The darker parts are lunar maria, basins cut out by ancient lava flows. Lunar regolith is the top several meters of soil layer on the lunar surface, comprised mainly of basaltic and anorthosite rock originating from volcanic flow and broken up by lunar impacts (McKay et al., 1991, Papike et al., 1982). The lunar highlands have more craters than the maria because _____. There are the dark gray regions called maria, which are lowlands . Rocks brought back from the lunar Maria during the Apollo landings are about 3.2 - 3.8 billion years old. Lunar craters are generally named after famous scientists. • Surface is covered with dust, similar to lunar regolith • Most surface material is similar to lunar highlands (deficient in Ti, Fe) • Surface is highly reflective (high albedo) indicating brighter minerals (unlike maria) • Atmosphere - Hardly worth mentioning, but present (about 5x10Hardly worth mentioning, but present (about 5x10-11 Less is known regarding Martian regolith, but material properties have been studied on the rover missions. Both the Maria and the Highlands exhibit large craters that are the result of meteor . (1)Elements which are more abundant in the maria (Fe, Ti, K, etc.) You are analyzing Moon rocks that contain small amounts of uranium-238, which decays into lead with a half-life of about 4.5 billion years. Lunar Maria (Seas) + more. The side of the Moon that faces away from the Earth, often called "the dark side of the Moon," is mainly covered with lunar highlands. This was the first landing to occur in the lunar highlands. The highlands are heavily cratered and mountainous. may yield more protons by nuclear disintegration than do other elements. Therefore, are the lunar highlands (older or younger) than 3.2 - 3.8 billion years. Oct, 02, 2017 Reading: For Today Shoemaker and Hackman, 1962 "Stratigraphic Basis for Lunar Time Scale". The maria often coincide with the "lowlands," but it is important to note that the lowlands (such as within the South Pole-Aitken basin) are not always covered by maria. From Earth, the lunar highlands appear as light regions while the maria - the lunar plains or "oceans" - appear dark. 1971), which exists in a state of crater density equilibrium (empirical saturation) for craters 250 km in diameter (Hartmann 1984, 1988, 1995; Hartmann & Gaskell 1993, 1997). OR The maria are much less cratered than the highlands, and cover just 17% of the lunar surface, mostly on the side of the Moon that faces Earth (Figure 3b). Lunar Highlands and Lunar Maria rock generate on the main planet alongside the normal stone. Compared to geology of the Lunar Highlands: Lunar highlands have more impact craters than the mare. This chunk of bubble-rich lava, collected by the Apollo 15 astronauts, typifies the surface rock of the dark maria (or "seas') on the Moon. Craters are larger and more abundant here than in the maria; this reflects . The Apollo Program's lunar landings resulted in an abundance of new scientific data about the Moon. (Pick the best answer.) . The time between 2 new moons is 29.5 days. These samples from the Moon offered a deeper appreciation of the evolution of our nearest planetary neighbor. We show that the ratio r(4/7) of the reflectances in band 4 (565nm) to band 7 (690nm) of data taken by the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter Camera (LROC) wide Lunar Maria Compared to geology of the Lunar Highlands: Lunar highlands have more impact craters than the mare. The light-colored highlands are hilly and are covered with craters. ([Th/Ti] c is the ratio of Th to Ti, normalized to the chrondritic ratio for these elements.] However, craters may be degraded by the cumulative effects of small impacts. Working on this approach, one should consider not only meteorites, but the source craters as well. Compared to geology of the Lunar Highlands: Lunar highlands have more impact craters than the mare. The maria are topographically benign at large However, telescopic observations showed that the maria are very flat, and are very different from the so-called highlands. Composite satellite photo of the of the Earth and moon. The lunar basaltic lava were far more fluid than Earth's lavas and thus formed smooth basins like oceans, as shown in the photography. Lava from the lunar "seas". List . On the barren floor of the Mare Imbrium are two of the most impressive single mountain peaks . If this is so, this may explain why there are no maria on this side of the Moon. Lunar basalts are less porous than the anorthosites, so highland's craters are generally deeper than maria's ones. Lunar Highlands The light coloured areas, the Lunar Highlands (also known, ironically as Terre, or Earth) are the oldest parts of the moon. Hadley on the edge of Mare Imbrium was taken by Dave Scott, one of the Apollo 15 astronauts. Highlands rock is lighter colored and less dense than maria rock; suggests highlands rock was initially molten and then separated/floated upward Maria rock is dark/dense lava. Commander John Young and Lunar Module Pilot Charlie Duke explored the surface in their . The highlands are depicted in the left image, which was taken by the Advanced. GlobeTrotter to lunar exploration, in particular as a versatile scouting capability in support of humans re-turning to the Moon. The lunar Alps, the Montes Alpes, sweep off to the northwest, enclosing the perfect oval crater, Plato. maria The major products of volcanic processes on the Moon are evident to Earth-bound observers in the form of the lunar maria. So the maria vs. high- lands areas proportion is —1:5. Dark regions on the Moon are called maria. The lighter parts on the moon are mountains and highlands. It follows from the comparison given that the minerals contained in regolith returned by the automatic station Luna 20 from the highland region of the moon had been crystallized from less reduced magma than had been the minerals of regolith returned by the automatic station Luna 16 from the Sea of Fertility. Lunar Volcanic Domes Origin and Composition They are the same age as the highlands because both features were formed by the hardening of lava. (Use my electronic version, which has better images and maps.) So, the highlands are older. These highlands still bear the scars and craters from stray asteroids and comets which smashed into our satellite at the time that the solar system was formed, around 4 billion years ago. They are less reflective than the "highlands" as a result of their iron-rich composition, and hence appear dark to the naked eye. What are lunar rilles. Lunar Highlands vs. Lunar Maria Cratering: Nearside vs. Farside Nearside Farside x x Lunar topography, km. They are more visible as they are at higher elevations. Their site north of Descartes crater was the only Apollo site in purely highlands terrain, where the surface is older, lighter in color, and more heavily cratered, in contrast to the darker basalts of the maria. 194 Giguere et al 1996, 1998). of Copernican period. Direct sampling of the lunar highland crust through targeted landers or sample-return missions, in addition to ascertaining the radiometric ages of different areas of the FHT and surrounding polar regions, will ultimately be required to test the compositional dichotomy between nearside-farside highlands crust. Are Highlands older than maria? That the near side is generally lower in elevation than the far side cannot be the whole explanation. the surface. . The highlands are older than the visible maria, and hence are more heavily cratered. of Copernican period. Besides the maria and highlands, the next most obvious surface feature on the moon are lunar craters. 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