'Much more water' found in lunar rocks

The Moon might be much wetter than previously thought, a group of scientists has said. A US-led team analysed the mineral apatite in lunar rocks picked up by the Apollo space missions and in a lunar meteorite found in North Africa.

The scientists found that there was at least 100 times more water in the Moon's minerals than they had previously believed.The new study has been published in the journal PNAS.This group is one of several different teams of researchers hunting for evidence of water on the Moon - and clues to how it got there.Lead author Francis McCubbin from the Carnegie Institution for Science in Washington DC told BBC News that the water content on the Moon ranges from 64 parts per billion to five parts per million.

"It would be about 2.5 times the volume of the Great Lakes," he said.

"Or another way of looking at it - if you took all of the water that was locked up inside the rocks of the Moon and put them on the surface, it would make a metre-thick layer covering the Moon.

"The scientist explained that the Moon most probably formed after a Mars-sized space body collided with the young Earth, some 4.5 billion years ago.

The high-energy impact produced molten debris, which eventually cooled to form our planet's only natural satellite.

Back then, he said, there was a magma ocean on the Moon. Magma contained water, which eventually erupted via "fire fountains" on to the lunar surface.

Most of this water evaporated during the volcanic activity - but some of it stayed, said Dr McCubbin.

"I like to use the analogy of someone who's trying to make non-alcoholic beer. There's always going to be some alcohol left," he explained.

via BBC News - 'Much more water' found in lunar rocks.