Water found on moon! And its still being formed.

Safin

This could be a big breakthrough for our quest to establish permanent moon base and in future a landing site on the moon for bigger conquests

YouTube - 'Water' found on the moon

Three different space probes have gathered evidence that the top layer of the moon's surface contains hidden stores of water.

The moon is generally thought to be a dry place, although scientists have long suspected that ice might be trapped in cold, permanently shadowed craters. A NASA mission will test that theory next month, by smashing a spent rocket part into a dark crater near the moon's south pole and creating a big debris cloud that will be searched for water.

But surprisingly, researchers have now found that there's water on the sunlit surface of the moon, where no one expected it to be.

Molecules of water as well as hydroxyl — that's just one atom of hydrogen with an oxygen atom, instead of the two hydrogen atoms normally found in water — are all over the lunar surface, in the very top layer of dust, according to new reports published online by the journal Science.

The first hint that the water might be there came from a NASA instrument called the Moon Mineralogy Mapper on board the Chandrayaan-1 spacecraft launched by India last October to orbit the moon.

A Shock To Researchers

The discovery was so surprising that researchers at first thought it was some kind of calibration problem. "Like any normal person, you'd say, 'Well, that's ridiculous, you know. It can't be there,' " says Carle Pieters, a planetary geologist at Brown University.

"So we spent months on the team, scrubbing this data with every means possible, arguing amongst ourselves," Pieters says, "and it would not go away."

Then they were able to confirm their observations using data from two additional spacecraft: NASA's Cassini probe that passed by the moon in 1999 while traveling to Saturn, and the Deep Impact spacecraft, which whizzed by the moon in June of this year on its way to visit a comet.

The water seems to be a very thin film of molecules stuck to the surface, says Jessica Sunshine of the University of Maryland-College Park.

"It's not liquid water, it's not frozen water and it's not gaseous water, OK? It's none of those things," Sunshine says. "It's not your grandmother's water on the moon. It's a completely different mindset. You sort of have to throw out everything you think of by that phrase."

Pieters concurs that the moon is still a very dry place. "There's no question about that. The amount of water is small," she says, even though it is found extensively over the moon's surface.

Still, the discovery has excited space buffs who say water and hydroxyl could be an important resource if astronauts ever return to the moon. NASA has spent the past few years working toward a return by 2020, and has even talked of plans for a lunar base, but that program is currently under review by the Obama administration.

I think its an amazing news for every one of us. A great week for Science actually. Some brilliant ideas and news for science came out this week. A first successful HIV trial, the question of water on moon and then the possibility of immortality.

I am pleased

Yamaraj

It's not proper water in any of its three forms (solid, liquid or gas), just some molecules that are interesting. If any of this is true then Chandrayaan-1 wasn't a complete failure after all. Or maybe it was a complete failure and an embarrassment, hence the news. But then, I'm a skeptic.

Safin

Lets be clear on this

This is data from the US spectrometer on board and as such was delievered as a payload by ISRO.

And this has been corroborated by 2 other instruments(on Cassini and Deep Impact space crafts of NASA).

The point is now in what form the water is formed. The very fact that it exists is a huge (HUGE) achievement. More than that, its a fantastic discovery. It opens its doors to many micro organisms kind of life bein present.

The presence of such water is widespread. That itself is awesome. Plus just imagine what could exist below the surface(something our rover will find out

)

Don't be a skeptic right now. This is one awesome discovery.

Yamaraj

I agree with the discovery part, but what's the use anyway? Moon as a planet will never sustain life for it has no atmosphere of its own. And US may have landed on this piece of rock some four decades ago, but they're still having a hard time going back on track with the program. At best, it'll provide some life-support for scientific experiments there.

If they had found Helium-3, however, that would've been an awesome news.

Safin

What this means is great news for a human shelter there that can reuse existing minerals and water present there.

And the space race will be driven by India, China and US from now on. So that "apathy" towards space is gonna go away pretty fast. Especially with China going for it.

Some of the key observations
1) Water found at all latitudes even the sun facing ones
2) Hydroxyl widely prevelant at 1" and 7" positions showing impact by crators(possibly) meaning there could be more present under the surface.

Kimi

NASA effect

Yamaraj

Originally Posted by Safin

What this means is great news for a human shelter there that can reuse existing minerals and water present there.

And the space race will be driven by India, China and US from now on. So that "apathy" towards space is gonna go away pretty fast. Especially with China going for it.

We aren't even in the race. The Chinese were successful at spacewalk in their first attempt and they have far better and efficient rocket designs (also used in ICBMs). I'm certainly not downplaying the partial success of Chandrayaan-1 by any means, but Indians are an emotional breed. A little success gets to our heads and then the whole country seizes on their bragging rights -- including our top brass. This will change only with a mature leadership which is unfortunately a pipe-dream for a nation full of old teenagers.

Let's not count ESA out either. Europeans have a solid space program, even though they're having a few problems with funding and other critical issues. Then there are Russians. We are effectively a new kid on the block. I wouldn't expect much from our chest-thumping ISRO experts.

On a related news:

New Images Reveal “Pure” Water Ice at Low Latitudes on Mars

Images of recent impact craters taken by the HiRISE Camera on the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter have revealed sub-surface water ice halfway between the north pole and the equator on Mars.

While the Phoenix lander imaged subsurface ice where the top layer of soil had been disturbed at the landing site near the north pole, these new images – taken in quick succession, detecting how the ice sublimated away — are the first to show evidence of water ice at much lower latitudes. Surprisingly, the white ice may be made from 99 percent pure water.

MRO took these images of a fresh, 6-meter-wide (20-foot-wide) crater on Mars on Oct. 18, 2008, (left) and on Jan. 14, 2009. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/University of Arizona

“We knew there was ice below the surface at high latitudes of Mars, but we find that it extends far closer to the equator than you would think, based on Mars’ climate today,” said Shane Byrne of the University of Arizona, a member of the High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment, or HiRISE camera.

“The other surprising discovery is that ice exposed at the bottom of these meteorite impact craters is so pure,” Byrne said. “The thinking before was that ice accumulates below the surface between soil grains, so there would be a 50-50 mix of dirt and ice. We were able to figure out, given how long it took that ice to fade from view, that the mixture is about one percent dirt and 99 percent ice.”

Scientists used several instruments on MRO to take a series of images, detecting and confirming highly pure, bright ice exposed in new craters, ranging from 1.5 feet to 8 feet deep, at five different Martian sites.

Earlier and later HiRISE images of a fresh meteorite crater 12 meters, or 40 feet, across located within Arcadia Planitia on Mars show how water ice excavated at the crater faded with time. The images, each 35 meters, or 115 feet across, were taken in November 2008 and January 2009. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/University of Arizona

The images here were taken of the Arcadia Planitia region, located northwest of the Tharsis region in the northern lowlands, at 40-60° North and 150-180° West. The before and after HiRISE images show a fresh meteorite crater 12 meters, or 40 feet, and reveal how water ice excavated at the crater faded with time. The images, each 35 meters, or 115 feet across, were taken in November 2008 and January 2009.

The discovery of these “white” impact craters began in August 2008, the orbiter’s Context camera team examined their images for any dark spots or other changes that weren’t visible in earlier images of the same area. Meteorites usually leave dark marks when they crash into dust-covered Mars terrain.
The HiRISE team followed up in September 2008 by taking high-resolution images of the dark spots.

“We saw something very unusual when we followed up on the first of these impact craters,” Byrne said, “and that was this bright blue material poking up from the bottom of the crater. It looked a lot like water ice. And sure enough, when we started monitoring this material, it faded away like you’d expect water ice to fade, because water ice is unstable on Mars’ surface and turns directly into water vapor in the atmosphere.”

The HiRISE camera on NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter took this image of a new, 8-meter (26-foot)-diameter meteorite impact crater in the topographically flat, dark plains within Vastitas Borealis, Mars, on November 1, 2008. Credit: NASA

A few days later in September 2008, the orbiter’s “CRISM” team used their Compact Reconnaissance Imaging Spectrometer for Mars and got the spectral signature of water ice exposed in one of the impact craters, further clinching the discovery.

“All of this had to happen very quickly because 200 days after we first saw the ice, it was gone, it was the color of dirt,” Byrne said. “If we had taken HiRISE images just a few months later, we wouldn’t have noticed anything unusual. This discovery would have just passed us by.”

How far water ice extends toward the equator depends largely on how much water has been available in the Martian atmosphere in the recent past, Byrne said: “The ice is a relic of a more humid climate not very long ago, perhaps just several thousand years ago.”

While Phoenix’s discovery of sub-surface ice was not totally unexpected, finding highly pure ice far closer to the equator because of random meteor impacts was unexpected, he said.

There are several theories about how a layer of such pure ice could have formed beneath Mars surface. Byrne said he thinks that one of the most promising ideas is that this ice on Mars formed in the same way that pure ice lenses form beneath the surface of the Earth.

This map shows five locations where fresh impact cratering has excavated water ice from just beneath the surface of Mars (sites 1 through 5) and the Viking Lander 2 landing site (VL2), in the context of color coding to indicate estimated depth to ice. Image Credit: NASA/JPL/University of Arizona

“That’s where you have very thin films of liquid water around ice grains and soil grains and they migrate around to form clear ice lenses on top of the ice table, even at temperatures well below zero. This process is called ‘frost heave’ on Earth, and it’s considered a nuisance in most places because it cracks up roads and tilts walls and destroys foundations of houses.

“But on Mars it would be of great interest if we could discover a process that involved liquid water in today’s climate, and not just in some of the warmest areas of the planet but in some of the coldest areas of the planet in the high latitude regions,” Byrne said.

This series of images spanning a period of 15 weeks shows a pair of fresh, middle-latitude craters on Mars in which some bright, bluish material apparent in the earliest images disappears by the later ones. Each panel is 75 meters (246 feet) across. The two craters are each about 4 meters (13 feet) in diameter and half a meter (1.5 feet) deep. Credit:NASA

Source: New Images Reveal “Pure” Water Ice at Low Latitudes on Mars | International Space Fellowship

Safin

I never said we will lead the space race. There is no doubt it will be led by China which has in effect unlimited funding(it can divert any amount into that) and can make its scientists work against their will

Europeans are hardly an economic power now to do much. They are stagnating economies and the growing ones will lead the pack and thats where India comes in.

Russia is ahead but stagnating and will continue to so so under its democracy which is as corrupt as any sub-saharan country

USA will always be there and a rising China will be motivation enough for them to go after the stars with increased zeal. Afterall the whole point they did anyway goto the moon was due to cold war rivalry.