The moon is the only celestial body that revolves around planet Earth. Such a discovery made in ancient times. At the same time, dark spots of various forms were discovered on the surface of the moon, which were subsequently mapped onto the map of the moon. From the 17th century, such spots began to be called seas.
At that time it was believed that the satellite of our planet possesses water, therefore, its surface is covered with seas and oceans. And the Italian astronomer Giovanni Riccioli had the idea to give them the names that remain to this day. The light parts of the surface are land.
The main characteristics of the moon
The mass of the moon is equal to 7.3476 * 1022 kg, which is 81.3 times less than the mass of the Earth. The equatorial radius of the satellite is 1,737 km, which is 3.6 times less than that of the Earth. On average, the distance from the Earth to the Moon is 384,400 km.
Exploring the only satellite of our planet, scientists around the world are still guessing about two issues:
- Are all space objects can be called miraculous?
- Are the Moon and Planet Earth randomly located where they are?
Doubts in the ranks of the scientific minds arise for various reasons. For example, the diameter of the satellite was fitted by someone like that, and someone placed it at such a distance from the Sun that, hitting between it and the nearest planet, the Moon, i.e. Earth, it is completely covered. This phenomenon is known to all as a solar eclipse. However, at the same time, people would not be able to observe such an event if this "natural" satellite were different - larger or smaller or the size of Mars.
What is part of the satellite of the Earth?
The whole moon is completely covered with regolith, which consists of dust and small fragments of meteorites. They often bombard the unprotected atmospheric layer of the lunar surface. Scientists believe that the thickness of such layers can be several centimeters or even tens of kilometers.
Schematically, the composition of the moon can be described as follows:
- The bark, which can be extremely heterogeneous and fluctuate from zero meters. So, for example, under the sea of Moscow, it is separated from the surface by a basalt layer up to 600 m thick, and up to 105 km on the dark side of the moon under the Queen's crater;
- Three layers of mantle, starting from the outer mantle;
- The nucleus is the metal center of the earth satellite.
Interesting facts about the moon
"The dark side" is missing
In fact, both sides of the moon take the same amount of sunlight, but only one of them is accessible to the earth's survey. This happens because the period of axial rotation of the moon converges with the orbital one. This means that the satellite is rotated to the Earth one-sidedly constantly. However, the "dark side" is investigated with the help of spacecraft.
The Influence of the Moon on the Earth's Tides
The gravity of the moon forms the presence of two bumps on Earth. One on the side wrapped to the moon, and the other on the opposite. Because of these projections and there are tides all over the planet.
"Runaway" from the Earth Moon
Each year, the satellite "runs away" from the Earth by 3.8 cm. Someone thought that in fifty billion years the Moon would simply run away. By that time, she will spend 47 days for an orbital flight.
The mass on the moon is much smaller.
The gravity of the moon is less than that of the Earth, making the weight of people on the satellite will be 1/6 less. Actually because of this, the astronauts jumped on it.
People on the moon: 12 astronauts visited the satellite
Since 1969, Neil Armstrong was the first to step on the satellite during the Apollo 11 mission, and the latter was fortunate enough to visit Eugene Cernan in 1972. After that, there were only robots on the moon.
Lack of atmosphere on the moon
On the lunar surface there is no protection from a wide variety of cosmic radiation, solar winds and meteorite bombardment. In addition, there are serious temperature fluctuations, no sounds are heard, and the sky is always black.
Scientists claim lunar earthquakes
They argue that this is due to earth gravity. The astronauts used seismographs and calculated that there are cracks and gaps in a couple of kilometers below the surface. It is assumed that the satellite has a molten core.
The first artificial satellite on the moon
It was the Soviet satellite program Luna-1. In 1959, he flew near the Moon at a distance of up to 6000 km, after which he went into solar orbit.
Is the moon an artificial satellite?
In the early 1960s, Mikhail Vasin and Alexander Shcherbakov from the USSR Academy of Sciences declared that the Moon could have appeared in an unnatural way. In this hypothesis, there are eight basic postulates. Scientists have analyzed some mysterious nuances, everything related to the satellite.
Eight Moon Secrets
First Secret: Is the Moon a Spaceship?
In reality, the orbit and magnitude of the moon at the physical level is not entirely possible. If everything were natural, one would think that these are very unusual “quirks” of the cosmos. This is based on the fact that the Moon occupies a quarter of the size of the Earth, and the ratio of the sizes of satellites and planets is usually much smaller.
The distance between the Moon and the Earth is such that the apparent dimensions are equivalent to the sun. Because of this, there is such a frequent phenomenon for earthlings as a total solar eclipse. The same mathematical impossibility explains the place and the mass ratio of two celestial objects. If the Earth had once attracted the Earth, it would have acquired a natural orbit. The presence of this orbit should have been elliptical, but it is surprisingly round.
Second secret: the presence of curvature of the surface
Scientists cannot explain the improbable curvature which the surface of the Moon possesses. The body of the moon is not round. After conducting geological studies, scientists decided that it is a planetoid, almost a hollow ball. At the same time, it is not clear how it can have such a strange structure and not collapse.
According to one of the versions proposed by the aforementioned scientists, the lunar crust was made artificially. Allegedly, it has a solid titanium frame. Russian scientists Vasin and Shcherbakov proved that the lunar crust and rocks have an extraordinary level of titanium, in some places a layer of titanium with a thickness of at least 30 km.
The third secret: the presence of lunar craters
Scientists explain a huge number of craters from meteorites on the lunar surface by the absence of the atmosphere. Space bodies, trying to get to Earth, meet with kilometers of its atmosphere, where they burn or decay. The moon has no protective layers of the atmosphere, therefore its surface is covered with all traces of meteorites left in it. These are craters of various sizes.
However, no one explains why they have such a small depth. And everything looks as if extremely durable material does not allow meteorites to break into the depths of the satellite. Moreover, even in craters with a diameter of more than 150 km, the depth does not exceed four kilometers. This is inexplicable in terms of what is relevant to science. Logically, there must be craters with a depth of at least fifty kilometers.
The fourth secret: the presence of "lunar seas"
Scientists are still arguing about how lunar oceans and seas could have been formed. According to one version, hardened lava could leak out after meteorite bombardment, if it were a hot planetoid.
However, according to physical signs, it is much more likely that the Moon, on the basis of its size, is a cold body. In addition, questions are caused by where the "lunar sea". So, it turned out that 80% of these objects are on the side of the satellite visible to Earth.
The fifth secret: the presence of maskon
Gravity on the lunar surface is not uniform. This was already noted by the crew of Apollo VIII, when flying over the lunar seas. Mascons (from the English. "Mass Concentration" - mass accumulation) are called places where substances are concentrated with greater density or in large quantities. In the case of the Moon, this principle is closely related to the lunar seas, because the mascons are located under them.
The sixth secret: the presence of geographical asymmetry
A shocking fact for science, which has not yet been explained, is the presence of geographical asymmetry on the lunar surface. So, on the legendary "dark" side of the moon there are much more mountains, craters, and other features in the relief. While most of the seas, on the contrary, are on the side visible from Earth.
Seventh secret: low density
The density of the moon is not higher than 60% of Earth's density. This fact proves why the Moon is not a planet, but a hollow object. In addition, some scientists believe that such a cavity may be of unnatural origin. However, given the location of the surface layers that have been identified, scientists dare to argue that the moon may look like a planet that could have formed "inside out." And this is used as an argument in favor of the "artificial casting" version.
Eighth secret: the origin
In the past century, three theories on the origin of the earth satellite were adopted over a long period. Nowadays, the majority in the scientific community accepted the hypothesis about the artificial origin of the moon as not unreasonable.
According to one theory, it is assumed that the moon is an earth fragment. However, differences in the characteristics of these two objects indicate the inconsistency of this theory. According to another theory, the represented celestial object was formed at the same time as our planet. Moreover, the material for their formation was the same cloud of cosmic gases. However, the preceding conclusion is valid regarding this judgment. Both objects should have at least similar structures.
The third theory suggests that the moon wandering in space was attracted by the earth's gravity. The big disadvantage of this theory is that the moon’s orbit is round and cyclical. Proof would be a distant or elliptical orbit.
However, there is another theory, the most incredible of all. It can be used to explain many anomalies that are associated with the earth satellite. If the moon was constructed by intelligent beings, then the physical laws, to the actions of which it obeys, would not be equally applicable to other celestial objects.
In the versions about the origin of the Moon, put forward by Soviet scientists, there is still a lot of interesting things. So far this is only some of the real physical estimates of the lunar anomalies. In addition, there are many other video, photo documents and surveys, proving that our "natural" satellite is not at all like that.
