Moon Hi-gab

The Moon is Earth's only natural satellite. It orbits around Earth at an average distance of (; about 30 times Earth's diameter). The Moon rotates, with a rotation period (lunar day) that is synchronized to its orbital period (lunar month) of 29.5 Earth days. This is the product of Earth's gravitation having tidally pulled on the Moon until one part of it stopped rotating away from the near side, making always the same lunar surface face Earth. Conversley, the gravitational pull of the Moon, on Earth, is the main driver of Earth's tides.

In geophysical terms, the Moon is a planetary-mass object or satellite planet. Its mass is 1.2% that of the Earth, and its diameter is , roughly one-quarter of Earth's (about as wide as the contiguous United States). Within the Solar System, it is the largest and most massive satellite in relation to its parent planet, the fifth-largest and fifth-most massive moon overall, and larger and more massive than all known dwarf planets. Its surface gravity is about one-sixth of Earth's, about half that of Mars, and the second-highest among all moons in the Solar System, after Jupiter's moon Io. The body of the Moon is differentiated and terrestrial, with no significant hydrosphere, atmosphere, or magnetic field. The lunar surface is covered in lunar dust and marked by mountains, impact craters, their ejecta, ray-like streaks, rilles and, mostly on the near side of the Moon, by dark maria ('seas'), which are plains of cooled lava. These maria were formed when molten lava flowed into ancient impact basins. The Moon formed 4.51 billion years ago, not long after Earth's formation, out of the debris from a giant impact between Earth and a hypothesized Mars-sized body called Theia.

The Moon is, except when passing through Earth's shadow during a lunar eclipse, always illuminated by the Sun, but from Earth the visible illumination shifts during its orbit, producing the lunar phases. The Moon is the brightest celestial object in Earth's night sky. This is mainly due to its large angular diameter, while the reflectance of the lunar surface is comparable to that of asphalt. The apparent size is nearly the same as that of the Sun, allowing it to cover the Sun completely during a total solar eclipse. From Earth about 59% of the lunar surface is visible due to cyclical shifts in perspective (libration), making parts of the far side of the Moon visible.

The Moon has been an important source of inspiration and knowledge for humans, having been crucial to cosmography, mythology, religion, art, time keeping, natural science, and spaceflight. The first human-made objects to fly to an extraterrestrial body were sent to the Moon, starting in 1959 with the flyby of the Soviet Union's ''Luna 1'' and the intentional impact of ''Luna 2''. In 1966, the first soft landing (by ''Luna 9'') and orbital insertion (by ''Luna 10'') followed. On July 20, 1969, humans for the first time stepped on an extraterrestrial body, landing on the Moon at Mare Tranquillitatis with the lander ''Eagle'' of the United States' Apollo 11 mission. Five more crews were sent between then and 1972, each with two men landing on the surface. The longest stay was 75 hours by the Apollo 17 crew. Since then, exploration of the Moon has continued robotically, and crewed missions are being planned to return beginning in the late 2020s.

Names and etymology

The English proper name for Earth's natural satellite is typically written as ''Moon'', with a capital ''M''. The noun ''moon'' is derived from Old English , which stems from Proto-Germanic ''*mēnōn'', which in turn comes from Proto-Indo-European ''*mēnsis'' 'month' (from earlier ''*mēnōt'', genitive ''*mēneses'') which may be related to the verb 'measure' (of time).

Occasionally, the name ''Luna'' is used in scientific writing and especially in science fiction to distinguish the Earth's moon from others, while in poetry "Luna" has been used to denote personification of the Moon. ''Cynthia'' is a rare poetic name for the Moon personified as a goddess, while ''Selene'' (literally 'Moon') is the Greek goddess of the Moon.

The English adjective pertaining to the Moon is ''lunar'', derived from the Latin word for the Moon, . ''Selenian'' is an adjective used to describe the Moon as a world, rather than as a celestial object, but its use is rare. It is derived from , the Greek word for the Moon, and its cognate ''selenic'' was originally a rare synonym but now nearly always refers to the chemical element selenium. The element name ''selenium'' and the prefix ''seleno-'' (as in ''selenography'', the study of the physical features of the Moon) come from this Greek word.

Artemis, the Greek goddess of the wilderness and the hunt, also came to be identified with Selene, and was sometimes called Cynthia after her birthplace on Mount Cynthus. Her Roman equivalent is Diana. The names Luna, Cynthia, and Selene are reflected in technical terms for lunar orbits such as ''apolune'', ''pericynthion'' and ''selenocentric''.

The astronomical symbols for the Moon are the crescent and decrescent , for example in ''M''_☾ 'lunar mass'.

Natural history

Lunar geologic timescale

The lunar geological periods are named after their characteristic features, from most impact craters outside the dark mare, to the mare and later craters, and finally the young, still bright and therefore readily visible craters with ray systems like Copernicus or Tycho.

Formation

Isotope dating of lunar samples suggests the Moon formed around 50 million years after the origin of the Solar System. Historically, several formation mechanisms have been proposed, but none satisfactorily explains the features of the Earth–Moon system. A fission of the Moon from Earth's crust through centrifugal force would require too great an initial rotation rate of Earth. Gravitational capture of a pre-formed Moon depends on an unfeasibly extended atmosphere of Earth to dissipate the energy of the passing Moon. A co-formation of Earth and the Moon together in the primordial accretion disk does not explain the depletion of metals in the Moon. None of these hypotheses can account for the high angular momentum of the Earth–Moon system.

The prevailing theory is that the Earth–Moon system formed after a giant impact of a Mars-sized body (named ''Theia'') with the proto-Earth. The oblique impact blasted material into orbit about the Earth and the material accreted and formed the Moon just beyond the Earth's Roche limit of ~.

Giant impacts are thought to have been common in the early Solar System. Computer simulations of giant impacts have produced results that are consistent with the mass of the lunar core and the angular momentum of the Earth–Moon system. These simulations show that most of the Moon derived from the impactor, rather than the proto-Earth. However, models from 2007 and later suggest a larger fraction of the Moon derived from the proto-Earth. Other bodies of the inner Solar System such as Mars and Vesta have, according to meteorites from them, very different oxygen and tungsten isotopic compositions compared to Earth. However, Earth and the Moon have nearly identical isotopic compositions. The isotopic equalization of the Earth–Moon system might be explained by the post-impact mixing of the vaporized material that formed the two, although this is debated.

The impact would have released enough energy to liquefy both the ejecta and the Earth's crust, forming a magma ocean. The liquefied ejecta could have then re-accreted into the Earth–Moon system. The newly formed Moon would have had its own magma ocean; its depth is estimated from about to .

While the giant-impact theory explains many lines of evidence, some questions are still unresolved, most of which involve the Moon's composition. Models that have the Moon acquiring a significant amount of the proto-earth are more difficult to reconcile with geochemical data for the isotopes of zirconium, oxygen, silicon, and other elements. A study published in 2022, using high-resolution simulations (up to particles), found that giant impacts can immediately place a satellite with similar mass and iron content to the Moon into orbit far outside Earth's Roche limit. Even satellites that initially pass within the Roche limit can reliably and predictably survive, by being partially stripped and then torqued onto wider, stable orbits.

On November 1, 2023, scientists reported that, according to computer simulations, remnants of Theia could still be present inside the Earth.

Natural development

The newly formed Moon settled into a much closer Earth orbit than it has today. Each body therefore appeared much larger in the sky of the other, eclipses were more frequent, and tidal effects were stronger.
Due to tidal acceleration, the Moon's orbit around Earth has become significantly larger, with a longer period.

Following formation, the Moon has cooled and most of its atmosphere has been stripped. The lunar surface has since been shaped by large impact events and many small ones, forming a landscape featuring craters of all ages.

The Moon was volcanically active until 1.2 billion years ago, which laid down the prominent lunar maria. Most of the mare basalts erupted during the Imbrian period, 3.3–3.7 billion years ago, though some are as young as 1.2 billion years and some as old as 4.2 billion years. There are differing explanations for the eruption of mare basalts, particularly their uneven occurrence which mainly appear on the near-side. Causes of the distribution of the lunar highlands on the far side are also not well understood. Topological measurements show the near side crust is thinner than the far side. One possible scenario then is that large impacts on the near side may have made it easier for lava to flow onto the surface.

Physical characteristics

The Moon is a very slightly scalene ellipsoid due to tidal stretching, with its long axis displaced 30° from facing the Earth, due to gravitational anomalies from impact basins. Its shape is more elongated than current tidal forces can account for. This 'fossil bulge' indicates that the Moon solidified when it orbited at half its current distance to the Earth, and that it is now too cold for its shape to restore hydrostatic equilibrium at its current orbital distance.

Size and mass

The Moon is by size and mass the fifth largest natural satellite of the Solar System, categorizable as one of its planetary-mass moons, making it a satellite planet under the geophysical definitions of the term. It is smaller than Mercury and considerably larger than the largest dwarf planet of the Solar System, Pluto. The Moon is the largest natural satellite in the Solar System relative to its primary planet.

The Moon's diameter is about 3,500 km, more than one-quarter of Earth's, with the face of the Moon comparable to the width of either mainland Australia, Europe or the contiguous United States. The whole surface area of the Moon is about 38 million square kilometers, comparable to that of the Americas.

The Moon's mass is of Earth's, being the second densest among the planetary moons, and having the second highest surface gravity, after Io, at and an escape velocity of .

Structure

The Moon is a differentiated body that was initially in hydrostatic equilibrium but has since departed from this condition. It has a geochemically distinct crust, mantle, and core. The Moon has a solid iron-rich inner core with a radius possibly as small as and a fluid outer core primarily made of liquid iron with a radius of roughly . Around the core is a partially molten boundary layer with a radius of about . This structure is thought to have developed through the fractional crystallization of a global magma ocean shortly after the Moon's formation 4.5 billion years ago.

Crystallization of this magma ocean would have created a mafic mantle from the precipitation and sinking of the minerals olivine, clinopyroxene, and orthopyroxene; after about three-quarters of the magma ocean had crystallized, lower-density plagioclase minerals could form and float into a crust atop. The final liquids to crystallize would have been initially sandwiched between the crust and mantle, with a high abundance of incompatible and heat-producing elements. Consistent with this perspective, geochemical mapping made from orbit suggests a crust of mostly anorthosite. The Moon rock samples of the flood lavas that erupted onto the surface from partial melting in the mantle confirm the mafic mantle composition, which is more iron-rich than that of Earth. The crust is on average about thick.

The Moon is the second-densest satellite in the Solar System, after Io. However, the inner core of the Moon is small, with a radius of about or less, around 20% of the radius of the Moon. Its composition is not well understood but is probably metallic iron alloyed with a small amount of sulfur and nickel. Analyses of the Moon's time-variable rotation suggest that it is at least partly molten. The pressure at the lunar core is estimated to be .

Gravitational field

On average the Moon's surface gravity is (; ), about half of the surface gravity of Mars and about a sixth of Earth's.

The Moon's gravitational field is not uniform. The details of the gravitational field have been measured through tracking the Doppler shift of radio signals emitted by orbiting spacecraft. The main lunar gravity features are mascons, large positive gravitational anomalies associated with some of the giant impact basins, partly caused by the dense mare basaltic lava flows that fill those basins. The anomalies greatly influence the orbit of spacecraft about the Moon. There are some puzzles: lava flows by themselves cannot explain all of the gravitational signature, and some mascons exist that are not linked to mare volcanism.

Magnetic field

The Moon has an external magnetic field of less than 0.2 nanoteslas, or less than one hundred thousandth that of Earth. The Moon does not have a global dipolar magnetic field and only has crustal magnetization likely acquired early in its history when a dynamo was still operating. Early in its history, 4 billion years ago, its magnetic field strength was likely close to that of Earth today. This early dynamo field apparently expired by about one billion years ago, after the lunar core had crystallized. Theoretically, some of the remnant magnetization may originate from transient magnetic fields generated during large impacts through the expansion of plasma clouds. These clouds are generated during large impacts in an ambient magnetic field. This is supported by the location of the largest crustal magnetizations situated near the antipodes of the giant impact basins.

Atmosphere

The Moon has an atmosphere consisting of only an exosphere, which is so tenuous as to be nearly vacuum, with a total mass of less than . The surface pressure of this small mass is around 3 × 10⁻¹⁵  atm (0.3  nPa); it varies with the lunar day. Its sources include outgassing and sputtering, a product of the bombardment of lunar soil by solar wind ions. Elements that have been detected include sodium and potassium, produced by sputtering (also found in the atmospheres of Mercury and Io); helium-4 and neon from the solar wind; and argon-40, radon-222, and polonium-210, outgassed after their creation by radioactive decay within the crust and mantle. The absence of such neutral species (atoms or molecules) as oxygen, nitrogen, carbon, hydrogen and magnesium, which are present in the regolith, is not understood. Water vapor has been detected by ''Chandrayaan-1'' and found to vary with latitude, with a maximum at ~60–70 degrees; it is possibly generated from the sublimation of water ice in the regolith. These gases either return into the regolith because of the Moon's gravity or are lost to space, either through solar radiation pressure or, if they are ionized, by being swept away by the solar wind's magnetic field.

Studies of Moon magma samples retrieved by the Apollo missions demonstrate that the Moon had once possessed a relatively thick atmosphere for a period of 70 million years between 3 and 4 billion years ago. This atmosphere, sourced from gases ejected from lunar volcanic eruptions, was twice the thickness of that of present-day Mars. The ancient lunar atmosphere was eventually stripped away by solar winds and dissipated into space.

A permanent Moon dust cloud exists around the Moon, generated by small particles from comets. Estimates are 5 tons of comet particles strike the Moon's surface every 24 hours, resulting in the ejection of dust particles. The dust stays above the Moon approximately 10 minutes, taking 5 minutes to rise, and 5 minutes to fall. On average, 120 kilograms of dust are present above the Moon, rising up to 100 kilometers above the surface. Dust counts made by LADEE's Lunar Dust EXperiment (LDEX) found particle counts peaked during the Geminid, Quadrantid, Northern Taurid, and Omicron Centaurid meteor showers, when the Earth, and Moon pass through comet debris. The lunar dust cloud is asymmetric, being denser near the boundary between the Moon's dayside and nightside.

Surface conditions

Ionizing radiation from cosmic rays, their resulting neutron radiation, and the Sun results in an average radiation level of 1.369 millisieverts per day during lunar daytime, which is about 2.6 times more than the level on the International Space Station, 510 times more than the level during a trans-Atlantic flight, and 200 times more than the level on Earth's surface. For further comparison, radiation levels average about 1.84 millisieverts per day on a flight to Mars and about 0.64 millisieverts per day on Mars itself, with some locations on Mars possibly having levels as low as 0.342 millisieverts per day.
Solar radiation also electrically charges the highly abrasive lunar dust and makes it levitate. This effect contributes to the easy spread of the sticky, lung- and gear-damaging lunar dust.

The Moon's axial tilt with respect to the ecliptic is only 1.5427°, much less than the 23.44° of Earth. This small axial tilt means that the Moon's solar illumination varies much less with season than Earth's, and it also allows for the existence of some peaks of eternal light at the Moon's north pole, at the rim of the crater Peary.

The lunar surface is exposed to drastic temperature differences ranging from to depending on the solar irradiance.
Because of the lack of atmosphere, temperatures of different areas vary particularly upon whether they are in sunlight or shadow, making topographical details play a decisive role on local surface temperatures.
Parts of many craters, particularly the bottoms of many polar craters, are permanently shadowed. These craters of eternal darkness have extremely low temperatures. The ''Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter'' measured the lowest summer temperatures in craters at the southern pole at and just close to the winter solstice in the north polar crater Hermite. This is the coldest temperature in the Solar System ever measured by a spacecraft, colder even than the surface of Pluto.

Blanketed on top of the Moon's crust is a highly comminuted (broken into ever smaller particles) and impact gardened mostly gray surface layer called regolith, formed by impact processes. The finer regolith, the lunar soil of silicon dioxide glass, has a texture resembling snow and a scent resembling spent gunpowder. The regolith of older surfaces is generally thicker than for younger surfaces: it varies in thickness from in the highlands and in the maria. Beneath the finely comminuted regolith layer is the megaregolith, a layer of highly fractured bedrock many kilometers thick.

These extreme conditions are considered to make it unlikely for spacecraft to harbor bacterial spores at the Moon for longer than just one lunar orbit.

Surface features

The topography of the Moon has been measured with laser altimetry and stereo image analysis. Its most extensive topographic feature is the giant far-side South Pole–Aitken basin, some in diameter, the largest crater on the Moon and the second-largest confirmed impact crater in the Solar System. At deep, its floor is the lowest point on the surface of the Moon, reaching at in a crater within Antoniadi crater. The highest elevations of the Moon's surface, with the so-called Selenean summit at , are located directly to the northeast (), which might have been thickened by the oblique formation impact of the South Pole–Aitken basin. Other large impact basins such as Imbrium, Serenitatis, Crisium, Smythii, and Orientale possess regionally low elevations and elevated rims. The far side of the lunar surface is on average about higher than that of the near side.

The discovery of fault scarp cliffs suggest that the Moon has shrunk by about 90 metres (300 ft) within the past billion years. Similar shrinkage features exist on Mercury. Mare Frigoris, a basin near the north pole long assumed to be geologically dead, has cracked and shifted. Since the Moon does not have tectonic plates, its tectonic activity is slow, and cracks develop as it loses heat.

Scientists have confirmed the presence of a cave on the Moon near the Sea of Tranquillity, not far from the 1969 Apollo 11 landing site. The cave, identified as an entry point to a collapsed lava tube, is roughly 45 meters wide and up to 80 m long. This discovery marks the first confirmed entry point to a lunar cave. The analysis was based on photos taken in 2010 by NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter. The cave's stable temperature of around could provide a hospitable environment for future astronauts, protecting them from extreme temperatures, solar radiation, and micrometeorites. However, challenges include accessibility and risks of avalanches and cave-ins. This discovery offers potential for future lunar bases or emergency shelters.

Volcanic features

The main features visible from Earth by the naked eye are dark and relatively featureless lunar plains called ''maria'' (singular ''mare''; Latin for "seas", as they were once believed to be filled with water) are vast solidified pools of ancient basaltic lava. Although similar to terrestrial basalts, lunar basalts have more iron and no minerals altered by water. The majority of these lava deposits erupted or flowed into the depressions associated with impact basins, though the Moon's largest expanse of basalt flooding, Oceanus Procellarum, does not correspond to an obvious impact basin. Different episodes of lava flow in maria can often be recognized by variations in surface albedo and distinct flow margins.

As the maria formed, cooling and contraction of the basaltic lava created wrinkle ridges in some areas. These low, sinuous ridges can extend for hundreds of kilometers and often outline buried structures within the mare. Another result of maria formation is the creation of concentric depressions along the edges, known as arcuate rilles. These features occur as the mare basalts sink inward under their own weight, causing the edges to fracture and separate.

In addition to the visible maria, the Moon has mare deposits covered by ejecta from impacts. Called cryptomares, these hidden mares are likely older than the exposed ones. Conversely, mare lava has obscured many impact melt sheets and pools. Impact melts are formed when intense shock pressures from collisions vaporize and melt zones around the impact site. Where still exposed, impact melt can be distinguished from mare lava by its distribution, albedo, and texture.

Sinuous rilles, found in and around maria, are likely extinct lava channels or collapsed lava tubes. They typically originate from volcanic vents, meandering and sometimes branching as they progress. The largest examples, such as Schroter's Valley and Rima Hadley, are significantly longer, wider, and deeper than terrestrial lava channels, sometimes featuring bends and sharp turns that again, are uncommon on Earth.

Mare volcanism has altered impact craters in various ways, including filling them to varying degrees, and raising and fracturing their floors from uplift of mare material beneath their interiors. Examples of such craters include Taruntius and Gassendi. Some craters, such as Hyginus, are of wholly volcanic origin, forming as calderas or collapse pits. Such craters are relatively rare and tend to be smaller (typically a few kilometers wide), shallower, and more irregularly shaped than impact craters. They also lack the upturned rims characteristic of impact craters.

Several geologic provinces containing shield volcanoes and volcanic domes are found within the near side maria. There are also some regions of pyroclastic deposits, scoria cones and non-basaltic domes made of particularly high viscosity lava.

Almost all maria are on the near side of the Moon, and cover 31% of the surface of the near side compared with 2% of the far side. This is likely due to a concentration of heat-producing elements under the crust on the near side, which would have caused the underlying mantle to heat up, partially melt, rise to the surface and erupt. Most of the Moon's mare basalts erupted during the Imbrian period, 3.3–3.7 billion years ago, though some being as young as 1.2 billion years and as old as 4.2 billion years.

In 2006, a study of Ina, a tiny depression in Lacus Felicitatis, found jagged, relatively dust-free features that, because of the lack of erosion by infalling debris, appeared to be only 2 million years old. Moonquakes and releases of gas indicate continued lunar activity. Evidence of recent lunar volcanism has been identified at 70 irregular mare patches, some less than 50 million years old. This raises the possibility of a much warmer lunar mantle than previously believed, at least on the near side where the deep crust is substantially warmer because of the greater concentration of radioactive elements. Evidence has been found for 2–10 million years old basaltic volcanism within the crater Lowell, inside the Orientale basin. Some combination of an initially hotter mantle and local enrichment of heat-producing elements in the mantle could be responsible for prolonged activities on the far side in the Orientale basin.

The lighter-colored regions of the Moon are called ''terrae'', or more commonly ''highlands'', because they are higher than most maria. They have been radiometrically dated to having formed 4.4 billion years ago and may represent plagioclase cumulates of the lunar magma ocean. In contrast to Earth, no major lunar mountains are believed to have formed as a result of tectonic events.

The concentration of maria on the near side likely reflects the substantially thicker crust of the highlands of the Far Side, which may have formed in a slow-velocity impact of a second moon of Earth a few tens of millions of years after the Moon's formation. Alternatively, it may be a consequence of asymmetrical tidal heating when the Moon was much closer to the Earth.

Impact craters

A major geologic process that has affected the Moon's surface is impact cratering, with craters formed when asteroids and comets collide with the lunar surface. There are estimated to be roughly 300,000 craters wider than on the Moon's near side. Lunar craters exhibit a variety of forms, depending on their size. In order of increasing diameter, the basic types are simple craters with smooth bowl shaped interiors and upturned rims, complex craters with flat floors, terraced walls and central peaks, peak ring basins, and multi-ring basins with two or more concentric rings of peaks. The vast majority of impact craters are circular, but some, like Cantor and Janssen, have more polygonal outlines, possibly guided by underlying faults and joints. Others, such as the Messier pair, Schiller, and Daniell, are elongated. Such elongation can result from highly oblique impacts, binary asteroid impacts, fragmentation of impactors before surface strike, or closely spaced secondary impacts.

The lunar geologic timescale is based on the most prominent impact events, such as multi-ring formations like Nectaris, Imbrium, and Orientale that are between hundreds and thousands of kilometers in diameter and associated with a broad apron of ejecta deposits that form a regional stratigraphic horizon. The lack of an atmosphere, weather, and recent geological processes mean that many of these craters are well-preserved. Although only a few multi-ring basins have been definitively dated, they are useful for assigning relative ages. Because impact craters accumulate at a nearly constant rate, counting the number of craters per unit area can be used to estimate the age of the surface.
However care needs to be exercised with the crater counting technique due to the potential presence of secondary craters. Ejecta from impacts can create secondary craters that often appear in clusters or chains but can also occur as isolated formations at a considerable distance from the impact. These can resemble primary craters, and may even dominate small crater populations, so their unidentified presence can distort age estimates.

The radiometric ages of impact-melted rocks collected during the Apollo missions cluster between 3.8 and 4.1 billion years old: this has been used to propose a Late Heavy Bombardment period of increased impacts.

High-resolution images from the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter in the 2010s show a contemporary crater-production rate significantly higher than was previously estimated. A secondary cratering process caused by distal ejecta is thought to churn the top two centimeters of regolith on a timescale of 81,000 years. This rate is 100 times faster than the rate computed from models based solely on direct micrometeorite impacts.

Lunar swirls

Lunar swirls are enigmatic features found across the Moon's surface. They are characterized by a high albedo, appear optically immature (i.e. the optical characteristics of a relatively young regolith), and often have a sinuous shape. Their shape is often accentuated by low albedo regions that wind between the bright swirls. They are located in places with enhanced surface magnetic fields and many are located at the antipodal point of major impacts. Well known swirls include the Reiner Gamma feature and Mare Ingenii. They are hypothesized to be areas that have been partially shielded from the solar wind, resulting in slower space weathering.

Presence of water

Liquid water cannot persist on the lunar surface. When exposed to solar radiation, water quickly decomposes through a process known as photodissociation and is lost to space. However, since the 1960s, scientists have hypothesized that water ice may be deposited by impacting comets or possibly produced by the reaction of oxygen-rich lunar rocks, and hydrogen from solar wind, leaving traces of water which could possibly persist in cold, permanently shadowed craters at either pole on the Moon. Computer simulations suggest that up to of the surface may be in permanent shadow. The presence of usable quantities of water on the Moon is an important factor in rendering lunar habitation as a cost-effective plan; the alternative of transporting water from Earth would be prohibitively expensive.

In years since, signatures of water have been found to exist on the lunar surface. In 1994, the bistatic radar experiment located on the ''Clementine'' spacecraft, indicated the existence of small, frozen pockets of water close to the surface. However, later radar observations by Arecibo, suggest these findings may rather be rocks ejected from young impact craters. In 1998, the neutron spectrometer on the ''Lunar Prospector'' spacecraft showed that high concentrations of hydrogen are present in the first meter of depth in the regolith near the polar regions. Volcanic lava beads, brought back to Earth aboard Apollo 15, showed small amounts of water in their interior.

The 2008 ''Chandrayaan-1'' spacecraft has since confirmed the existence of surface water ice, using the on-board Moon Mineralogy Mapper. The spectrometer observed absorption lines common to hydroxyl, in reflected sunlight, providing evidence of large quantities of water ice, on the lunar surface. The spacecraft showed that concentrations may possibly be as high as 1,000  ppm. Using the mapper's reflectance spectra, indirect lighting of areas in shadow confirmed water ice within 20° latitude of both poles in 2018. In 2009, ''LCROSS'' sent a impactor into a permanently shadowed polar crater, and detected at least of water in a plume of ejected material. Another examination of the LCROSS data showed the amount of detected water to be closer to .

In May 2011, 615–1410 ppm water in melt inclusions in lunar sample 74220 was reported, the famous high-titanium "orange glass soil" of volcanic origin collected during the Apollo 17 mission in 1972. The inclusions were formed during explosive eruptions on the Moon approximately 3.7 billion years ago. This concentration is comparable with that of magma in Earth's upper mantle. Although of considerable selenological interest, this insight does not mean that water is easily available since the sample originated many kilometers below the surface, and the inclusions are so difficult to access that it took 39 years to find them with a state-of-the-art ion microprobe instrument.

Analysis of the findings of the Moon Mineralogy Mapper (M3) revealed in August 2018 for the first time "definitive evidence" for water-ice on the lunar surface. The data revealed the distinct reflective signatures of water-ice, as opposed to dust and other reflective substances. The ice deposits were found on the North and South poles, although it is more abundant in the South, where water is trapped in permanently shadowed craters and crevices, allowing it to persist as ice on the surface since they are shielded from the sun.

In October 2020, astronomers reported detecting molecular water on the sunlit surface of the Moon by several independent spacecraft, including the Stratospheric Observatory for Infrared Astronomy (SOFIA).

Earth–Moon system

Orbit

The Earth and the Moon form the Earth–Moon satellite system with a shared center of mass, or barycenter. This barycenter is (about a quarter of Earth's radius) beneath the Earth's surface.

The Moon's orbit is slightly elliptical, with an orbital eccentricity of 0.055.
The semi-major axis of the geocentric lunar orbit, called the lunar distance, is approximately 400,000 km (250,000 miles or 1.28 light-seconds), comparable to going around Earth 9.5 times.

The Moon makes a complete orbit around Earth with respect to the fixed stars, its sidereal period, about once every 27.3 days. However, because the Earth–Moon system moves at the same time in its orbit around the Sun, it takes slightly longer, 29.5 days, to return to the same lunar phase, completing a full cycle, as seen from Earth. This synodic period or synodic month is commonly known as the lunar month and is equal to the length of the solar day on the Moon.

Due to tidal locking, the Moon has a 1:1 spin–orbit resonance. This rotation–orbit ratio makes the Moon's orbital periods around Earth equal to its corresponding rotation periods. This is the reason for only one side of the Moon, its so-called near side, being visible from Earth. That said, while the movement of the Moon is in resonance, it still is not without nuances such as libration, resulting in slightly changing perspectives, making over time and location on Earth about 59% of the Moon's surface visible from Earth.

Unlike most satellites of other planets, the Moon's orbital plane is closer to the ecliptic plane than to the planet's equatorial plane. The Moon's orbit is subtly perturbed by the Sun and Earth in many small, complex and interacting ways. For example, the plane of the Moon's orbit gradually rotates once every 18.61years, which affects other aspects of lunar motion. These follow-on effects are mathematically described by Cassini's laws.

Tidal effects

The gravitational attraction that Earth and the Moon (as well as the Sun) exert on each other manifests in a slightly greater attraction on the sides closest to each other, resulting in tidal forces. Ocean tides are the most widely experienced result of this, but tidal forces also considerably affect other mechanics of Earth, as well as the Moon and their system.

The lunar solid crust experiences tides of around amplitude over 27 days, with three components: a fixed one due to Earth, because they are in synchronous rotation, a variable tide due to orbital eccentricity and inclination, and a small varying component from the Sun. The Earth-induced variable component arises from changing distance and libration, a result of the Moon's orbital eccentricity and inclination (if the Moon's orbit were perfectly circular and un-inclined, there would only be solar tides). According to recent research, scientists suggest that the Moon's influence on the Earth may contribute to maintaining Earth's magnetic field.

The cumulative effects of stress built up by these tidal forces produces moonquakes. Moonquakes are much less common and weaker than are earthquakes, although moonquakes can last for up to an hour – significantly longer than terrestrial quakes – because of scattering of the seismic vibrations in the dry fragmented upper crust. The existence of moonquakes was an unexpected discovery from seismometers placed on the Moon by Apollo astronauts from 1969 through 1972.

The most commonly known effect of tidal forces is elevated sea levels called ocean tides. While the Moon exerts most of the tidal forces, the Sun also exerts tidal forces and therefore contributes to the tides as much as 40% of the Moon's tidal force; producing in interplay the spring and neap tides.

The tides are two bulges in the Earth's oceans, one on the side facing the Moon and the other on the side opposite. As the Earth rotates on its axis, one of the ocean bulges (high tide) is held in place "under" the Moon, while another such tide is opposite. The tide under the Moon is explained by the Moon's gravity being stronger on the water close to it. The tide on the opposite side can be explained either by the centrifugal force as the Earth orbits the barycenter or by the water's inertia as the Moon's gravity is stronger on the solid Earth close to it and it is pull away from the farther water.

Thus, there are two high tides, and two low tides in about 24 hours. Since the Moon is orbiting the Earth in the same direction of the Earth's rotation, the high tides occur about every 12 hours and 25 minutes; the 25 minutes is due to the Moon's time to orbit the Earth.

If the Earth were a water world (one with no continents) it would produce a tide of only one meter, and that tide would be very predictable, but the ocean tides are greatly modified by other effects:
* the frictional coupling of water to Earth's rotation through the ocean floors
* the inertia of water's movement
* ocean basins that grow shallower near land
* the sloshing of water between different ocean basins
As a result, the timing of the tides at most points on the Earth is a product of observations that are explained, incidentally, by theory.

System evolution

Delays in the tidal peaks of both ocean and solid-body tides cause torque in opposition to the Earth's rotation. This "drains" angular momentum and rotational kinetic energy from Earth's rotation, slowing the Earth's rotation. That angular momentum, lost from the Earth, is transferred to the Moon in a process known as tidal acceleration, which lifts the Moon into a higher orbit while lowering orbital speed around the Earth.

Thus the distance between Earth and Moon is increasing, and the Earth's rotation is slowing in reaction. Measurements from laser reflectors left during the Apollo missions ( lunar ranging experiments) have found that the Moon's distance increases by per year (roughly the rate at which human fingernails grow).
Atomic clocks show that Earth's Day lengthens by about 17 microseconds every year, slowly increasing the rate at which UTC is adjusted by leap seconds.

This tidal drag makes the rotation of the Earth, and the orbital period of the Moon very slowly match. This matching first results in tidally locking the lighter body of the orbital system, as is already the case with the Moon. Theoretically, in 50 billion years, the Earth's rotation will have slowed to the point of matching the Moon's orbital period, causing the Earth to always present the same side to the Moon. However, the Sun will become a red giant, most likely engulfing the Earth–Moon system long before then.

If the Earth–Moon system isn't engulfed by the enlarged Sun, the drag from the solar atmosphere can cause the orbit of the Moon to decay. Once the orbit of the Moon closes to a distance of , it will cross Earth's Roche limit, meaning that tidal interaction with Earth would break apart the Moon, turning it into a ring system. Most of the orbiting rings will begin to decay, and the debris will impact Earth. Hence, even if the Sun does not swallow up Earth, the planet may be left moonless.

Position and appearance

The Moon's highest altitude at culmination varies by its lunar phase, or more correctly its orbital position, and time of the year, or more correctly the position of the Earth's axis. The full moon is highest in the sky during winter and lowest during summer (for each hemisphere respectively), with its altitude changing towards dark moon to the opposite.

At the North and South Poles the Moon is 24 hours above the horizon for two weeks every tropical month (about 27.3 days), comparable to the polar day of the tropical year. Zooplankton in the Arctic use moonlight when the Sun is below the horizon for months on end.

The apparent orientation of the Moon depends on its position in the sky and the hemisphere of the Earth from which it is being viewed. In the northern hemisphere it appears upside down compared to the view from the southern hemisphere. Sometimes the "horns" of a crescent moon appear to be pointing more upwards than sideways. This phenomenon is called a wet moon and occurs more frequently in the tropics.

The distance between the Moon and Earth varies from around (perigee) to (apogee), making the Moon's distance and apparent size fluctuate up to 14%. On average the Moon's angular diameter is about 0.52°, roughly the same apparent size as the Sun (see ). In addition, a purely psychological effect, known as the Moon illusion, makes the Moon appear larger when close to the horizon.

Rotation

The tidally locked synchronous rotation of the Moon as it orbits the Earth results in it always keeping nearly the same face turned towards the planet. The side of the Moon that faces Earth is called the near side, and the opposite the far side. The far side is often inaccurately called the "dark side", but it is in fact illuminated as often as the near side: once every 29.5 Earth days. During dark moon to new moon, the near side is dark.

The Moon originally rotated at a faster rate, but early in its history its rotation slowed and became tidally locked in this orientation as a result of frictional effects associated with tidal deformations caused by Earth. With time, the energy of rotation of the Moon on its axis was dissipated as heat, until there was no rotation of the Moon relative to Earth. In 2016, planetary scientists using data collected on the 1998–99 NASA ''Lunar Prospector'' mission found two hydrogen-rich areas (most likely former water ice) on opposite sides of the Moon. It is speculated that these patches were the poles of the Moon billions of years ago before it was tidally locked to Earth.

Illumination and phases

The Moon rotates, as it orbits Earth, changing orientation toward the Sun, experiencing a lunar day. A lunar day is equal to one lunar month (one synodic orbit around Earth) due to it being tidally locked to Earth. Since the Moon is not tidally locked to the Sun, lunar daylight and night times both occur around the Moon. The changing position of the illumination of the Moon by the Sun during a lunar day is observable from Earth as the changing lunar phases, waxing crescent being the sunrise and the waning crescent the sunset phase of a day observed from afar.

Lunar night is the darkest on the far side and during lunar eclipses on the near side (and darker than a moonless night on Earth). The near side is during its night illuminated by Earthlight, making the near side illuminated enough by the Earthlight to see lunar surface features from Earth where it is dark during its night phase due to Earthlight being reflected back to Earth. Earthshine makes the night on the near side about 43 times brighter, and sometimes even 55 times brighter than a night on Earth illuminated by the light of the full moon.

In Earth's sky brightness and apparent size of the Moon changes also due to its elliptic orbit around Earth. At perigee (closest), since the Moon is up to 14% closer to Earth than at apogee (most distant), it subtends a solid angle which is up to 30% larger. Consequently, given the same phase, the Moon's brightness also varies by up to 30% between apogee and perigee. A full (or new) moon at such a position is called a supermoon.

Observational phenomena

There has been historical controversy over whether observed features on the Moon's surface change over time. Today, many of these claims are thought to be illusory, resulting from observation under different lighting conditions, poor astronomical seeing, or inadequate drawings. However, outgassing does occasionally occur and could be responsible for a minor percentage of the reported lunar transient phenomena. Recently, it has been suggested that a roughly diameter region of the lunar surface was modified by a gas release event about a million years ago.

Albedo and color

The Moon has an exceptionally low albedo, giving it a reflectance that is slightly brighter than that of worn asphalt. Despite this, it is the brightest object in the sky after the Sun. This is due partly to the brightness enhancement of the opposition surge; the Moon at quarter phase is only one-tenth as bright, rather than half as bright, as at full moon. Additionally, color constancy in the visual system recalibrates the relations between the colors of an object and its surroundings, and because the surrounding sky is comparatively dark, the sunlit Moon is perceived as a bright object. The edges of the full moon seem as bright as the center, without limb darkening, because of the reflective properties of lunar soil, which retroreflects light more towards the Sun than in other directions. The Moon's color depends on the light the Moon reflects, which in turn depends on the Moon's surface and its features, having for example large darker regions. In general, the lunar surface reflects a brown-tinged gray light.

At times, the Moon can appear red or blue.
It may appear red during a lunar eclipse, because of the red spectrum of the Sun's light being refracted onto the Moon by Earth's atmosphere. Because of this red color, lunar eclipses are also sometimes called blood moons. The Moon can also seem red when it appears at low angles and through a thick atmosphere.

The Moon may appear blue depending on the presence of certain particles in the air, such as volcanic particles, in which case it can be called a blue moon.

Because the words "red moon" and "blue moon" can also be used to refer to specific full moons of the year, they do not always refer to the presence of red or blue moonlight.

Eclipses

Eclipses only occur when the Sun, Earth, and Moon are all in a straight line (termed " syzygy"). Solar eclipses occur at new moon, when the Moon is between the Sun and Earth. In contrast, lunar eclipses occur at full moon, when Earth is between the Sun and Moon. The apparent size of the Moon is roughly the same as that of the Sun, with both being viewed at close to one-half a degree wide. The Sun is much larger than the Moon, but it is the vastly greater distance that gives it the same apparent size as the much closer and much smaller Moon from the perspective of Earth. The variations in apparent size, due to the non-circular orbits, are nearly the same as well, though occurring in different cycles. This makes possible both total (with the Moon appearing larger than the Sun) and annular (with the Moon appearing smaller than the Sun) solar eclipses. In a total eclipse, the Moon completely covers the disc of the Sun and the solar corona becomes visible to the naked eye.

Because the distance between the Moon and Earth is very slowly increasing over time, the angular diameter of the Moon is decreasing. As it evolves toward becoming a red giant, the size of the Sun, and its apparent diameter in the sky, are slowly increasing. The combination of these two changes means that hundreds of millions of years ago, the Moon would always completely cover the Sun on solar eclipses, and no annular eclipses were possible. Likewise, hundreds of millions of years in the future, the Moon will no longer cover the Sun completely, and total solar eclipses will not occur.

As the Moon's orbit around Earth is inclined by about 5.145° (5° 9') to the orbit of Earth around the Sun, eclipses do not occur at every full and new moon. For an eclipse to occur, the Moon must be near the intersection of the two orbital planes. The periodicity and recurrence of eclipses of the Sun by the Moon, and of the Moon by Earth, is described by the saros, which has a period of approximately 18 years.

Because the Moon continuously blocks the view of a half-degree-wide circular area of the sky, the related phenomenon of occultation occurs when a bright star or planet passes behind the Moon and is occulted: hidden from view. In this way, a solar eclipse is an occultation of the Sun. Because the Moon is comparatively close to Earth, occultations of individual stars are not visible everywhere on the planet, nor at the same time. Because of the precession of the lunar orbit, each year different stars are occulted.

History of exploration and human presence

Pre-telescopic observation (before 1609)

It is believed by some that the oldest cave paintings from up to 40,000 BP of bulls and geometric shapes, or 20–30,000 year old tally sticks were used to observe the phases of the Moon, keeping time using the waxing and waning of the Moon's phases.
Aspects of the Moon were identified and aggregated in lunar deities from prehistoric times and were eventually documented and put into symbols from the very first instances of writing in the 4th millennium BC. One of the earliest-discovered possible depictions of the Moon is a 3,000 BCE rock carving ''Orthostat 47'' at Knowth, Ireland. The crescent depicting the Moon as with the lunar deity Nanna/Sin have been found from the 3rd millennium BCE.

The oldest named astronomer and poet Enheduanna, Akkadian high priestess to the lunar deity Nanna/Sin and pricess, daughter of Sargon the Great ( – BCE), had the Moon tracked in her chambers. The oldest found and identified depiction of the Moon in an astronomical relation to other astronomical features is the Nebra sky disc from , depicting features like the Pleiades next to the Moon.

The ancient Greek philosopher Anaxagoras () reasoned that the Sun and Moon were both giant spherical rocks, and that the latter reflected the light of the former. Elsewhere in the to , Babylonian astronomers had recorded the 18-year Saros cycle of lunar eclipses, and Indian astronomers had described the Moon's monthly elongation. The Chinese astronomer Shi Shen gave instructions for predicting solar and lunar eclipses.

In Aristotle's (384–322 BC) description of the universe, the Moon marked the boundary between the spheres of the mutable elements (earth, water, air and fire), and the imperishable stars of aether, an influential philosophy that would dominate for centuries. Archimedes (287–212 BC) designed a planetarium that could calculate the motions of the Moon and other objects in the Solar System. In the , Seleucus of Seleucia correctly thought that tides were due to the attraction of the Moon, and that their height depends on the Moon's position relative to the Sun. In the same century, Aristarchus computed the size and distance of the Moon from Earth, obtaining a value of about twenty times the radius of Earth for the distance.

The Chinese of the Han dynasty believed the Moon to be energy equated to '' qi'' and their 'radiating influence' theory recognized that the light of the Moon was merely a reflection of the Sun; Jing Fang (78–37 BC) noted the sphericity of the Moon. Ptolemy (90–168 AD) greatly improved on the numbers of Aristarchus, calculating a mean distance of 59 times Earth's radius and a diameter of 0.292 Earth diameters, close to the correct values of about 60 and 0.273 respectively. In the 2nd century AD, Lucian wrote the novel ''A True Story'', in which the heroes travel to the Moon and meet its inhabitants. In 510 AD, the Indian astronomer Aryabhata mentioned in his ''Aryabhatiya'' that reflected sunlight is the cause of the shining of the Moon.Hayashi (2008), "Aryabhata I", ''Encyclopædia Britannica''. The astronomer and physicist Ibn al-Haytham (965–1039) found that sunlight was not reflected from the Moon like a mirror, but that light was emitted from every part of the Moon's sunlit surface in all directions. Shen Kuo (1031–1095) of the Song dynasty created an allegory equating the waxing and waning of the Moon to a round ball of reflective silver that, when doused with white powder and viewed from the side, would appear to be a crescent. During the Middle Ages, before the invention of the telescope, the Moon was increasingly recognized as a sphere, though many believed that it was "perfectly smooth".

Telescopic exploration (1609–1959)

The telescope was developed and reported on in 1608. The first record of telescopic astronomy and rough mapping of the Moon's features is from early summer 1609 by Thomas Harriot, but which he did not publish. At the same time Galileo Galilei too started to use telescopes to observe the sky and the Moon, recording later that year more detailed observations and crucial conclusions, such as that the Moon was not smooth, featuring mountains and craters, which he published in 1610 in his ground-breaking and soon widely discussed book .

Later in the 17th century, the efforts of Giovanni Battista Riccioli and Francesco Maria Grimaldi led to the system of naming of lunar features in use today. The more exact 1834–1836 of Wilhelm Beer and Johann Heinrich von Mädler, and their associated 1837 book , the first trigonometrically accurate study of lunar features, included the heights of more than a thousand mountains, and introduced the study of the Moon at accuracies possible in earthly geography. Lunar craters, first noted by Galileo, were thought to be volcanic until the 1870s proposal of Richard Proctor that they were formed by collisions. This view gained support in 1892 from the experimentation of geologist Grove Karl Gilbert, and from comparative studies from 1920 to the 1940s, leading to the development of lunar stratigraphy, which by the 1950s was becoming a new and growing branch of astrogeology.

First missions to the Moon (1959–1976)

After World War II the first launch systems were developed and by the end of the 1950s they reached capabilities that allowed the Soviet Union and the United States to launch spacecraft into space. The Cold War fueled a closely followed development of launch systems by the two states, resulting in the so-called Space Race and its later phase the Moon Race, accelerating efforts and interest in exploration of the Moon.

After the first spaceflight of Sputnik 1 in 1957 during International Geophysical Year the spacecraft of the Soviet Union's ''Luna'' program were the first to accomplish a number of goals. Following three unnamed failed missions in 1958, the first human-made object ''Luna 1'' escaped Earth's gravity and passed near the Moon in 1959. Later that year the first human-made object ''Luna 2'' reached the Moon's surface by intentionally impacting. By the end of the year ''Luna 3'' reached as the first human-made object the normally occluded far side of the Moon, taking the first photographs of it.
The first spacecraft to perform a successful lunar soft landing was ''Luna 9'' and the first vehicle to orbit the Moon was ''Luna 10'', both in 1966.

Following President John F. Kennedy's 1961 commitment to a crewed Moon landing before the end of the decade, the United States, under NASA leadership, launched a series of uncrewed probes to develop an understanding of the lunar surface in preparation for human missions: the Jet Propulsion Laboratory's Ranger program, the Lunar Orbiter program and the Surveyor program. The crewed Apollo program was developed in parallel; after a series of uncrewed and crewed tests of the Apollo spacecraft in Earth orbit, and spurred on by a potential Soviet lunar human landing, in 1968 Apollo 8 made the first human mission to lunar orbit (the first Earthlings, two tortoises, had circled the Moon three months earlier on the Soviet Union's Zond 5, followed by turtles on Zond 6).

The first time a person landed on the Moon and any extraterrestrial body was when Neil Armstrong, the commander of the American mission Apollo 11, set foot on the Moon at 02:56 UTC on July 21, 1969. Considered the culmination of the Space Race, an estimated 500 million people worldwide watched the transmission by the Apollo TV camera, the largest television audience for a live broadcast at that time. While at the same time another mission, the robotic sample return mission Luna 15 by the Soviet Union had been in orbit around the Moon, becoming together with Apollo 11 the first ever case of two extraterrestrial missions being conducted at the same time.

The Apollo missions 11 to 17 (except Apollo 13, which aborted its planned lunar landing) removed of lunar rock and soil in 2,196 separate samples.
Scientific instrument packages were installed on the lunar surface during all the Apollo landings. Long-lived instrument stations, including heat flow probes, seismometers, and magnetometers, were installed at the Apollo 12, 14, 15, 16, and 17 landing sites. Direct transmission of data to Earth concluded in late 1977 because of budgetary considerations, but as the stations' lunar laser ranging corner-cube retroreflector arrays are passive instruments, they are still being used.
Apollo 17 in 1972 remains the last crewed mission to the Moon. Explorer 49 in 1973 was the last dedicated U.S. probe to the Moon until the 1990s.

The Soviet Union continued sending robotic missions to the Moon until 1976, deploying in 1970 with Luna 17 the first remote controlled rover Lunokhod 1 on an extraterrestrial surface, and collecting and returning 0.3 kg of rock and soil samples with three ''Luna'' sample return missions (''Luna 16'' in 1970, ''Luna 20'' in 1972, and ''Luna 24'' in 1976).

Moon Treaty and explorational absence (1976–1990)

Following the last Soviet mission to the Moon of 1976, there was little further lunar exploration for fourteen years. Astronautics had shifted its focus towards the exploration of the inner (e.g. Venera program) and outer

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