Engadget - The moon is older than we thought

It's Wednesday, October 25, 2023.

Researchers have just discovered that the moon is about 40 million years older than previously thought. Which is a big difference. In a study published by the European Association of Geochemistry, scientists looked at the age of crystal formations. The prevalence of zircon crystals in the samples, collected years ago from NASA’s Apollo program back in 1972, suggests that the surface of the moon was created around 110 million years after the formation of the solar system.

NASA’s theory is that a Mars-sized object collided with Earth several billion years ago to form the moon. This new baseline age of the moon gives scientists a rough idea of when that collision might have occurred.

– Mat Smith

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