[music]
In the time before the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter, most
lunar orbiting missions had a lifespan of one to two years.
But now, LRO has shattered all records and been at the Moon for
one hundred lunar days – that’s eight years of data collection.
This mission has truly ushered in a new era of lunar and
planetary science. One of the biggest accomplishments is that
LRO’s high-resolution camera has been able to image almost the
entire lunar surface, down to one meter of resolution. This
has opened a treasure trove of new data about geological
processes and areas that may be best suited for future
exploration. One hundred lunar days has also given us more time
study the Moon’s far side in more detail than ever before. We
now know, for example, that the Compton-Belkovich volcanic
complex formed from a rare type of lava about 3.7 billion years
ago. This helps paint a new picture of the Moon’s history.
The Moon has not only had a wide range of complex geologic
processes, but its volcanism may have also changed over time. LRO
has also been able to measure something you may not have heard
about: the lunar tide – or how much the Moon’s surface actually
flexes and cracks due to the gravitational pull of the Earth.
There’s still a lot to learn about this ongoing process,
making our Moon an important case study when thinking about
other planets and moons. Over its lifetime of 4 1/2 billion
years, the Moon has also been bombarded by all sorts of
asteroids and comets. This has left millions of impact craters
on the surface. For planetary scientists, however, there had
been no way to identify newly formed craters. But when LRO
arrived, all this changed. By comparing pictures taken earlier
in the mission with more recent images, NASA scientists have
discovered more than sixty new impact craters, like this one
from 2013. And that’s not all. LRO’s instruments are able to
study both new and old craters in ways we never have before.
LOLA, for example, helps create topographic 3-D maps, and
Mini-RF has detected evidence of water ice inside deep craters at
the lunar poles. All of this is important for space science as a
whole. Craters are used to help determine the age of a surface,
how hot or cold a planet is, and how thick a planet’s atmosphere
might be. Observing new impact craters also gives us better
insight into what happens when a meteorite strikes a planetary
surface. And this touches upon a key point - our Moon is more
than just a rock. It’s the cornerstone for understanding
our solar system and beyond. It has a dynamic history that we
are still learning about and features we are still
discovering. By being at the Moon for one hundred lunar days
and counting, we continue to expand our knowledge of our
nearest neighbor in space, and with that,
the rest of the universe.
[beeping]