The Indian Space Research Organisation has reported a successful soft landing of Chandrayaan-3 in a 3.85-billion-year-old geo crater on the lunar surface. Ahmedabad-based Physical Research Laboratory and the Indian Space Research Organisation ISRO scientists on Saturday announced the identification of the landing to point out that this crater is one of the earliest formations on the Lunar surface.
S. Vijayan, an associate professor in the Planetary Sciences Division at the Physical Research Laboratory, says that the area where the Chandrayaan-3 mission’s Pragyan rover has landed is like nothing he has ever seen. “The target area chosen for Chandrayaan-3 is an entirely new geophysical environment that no other missions have attempted”, Vijayan continued. He also pointed out that the images of the Moon taken by the Pragyan rover are the first on-location photographs of the lunar surface at this latitude, and such data is critical in understanding the formation of the Moon and its geological history.
The formation of the crater is attributed to the Nectarian age, around 3.85 billion years ago, during a very active geological period on the Moon. Craters are formed when an asteroid impacts on to a larger astronomical body, expelling a material known as ejecta. That observation was made possible with the help of the images received from the Pragyan rover, stating that half of the area has been covered with ejecta from the South Pole-Aitken – easily the largest and the most famous impact basin of the Moon.
Researchers have clarified the distinction between impact basins and craters: An impact basin is usually larger than kilometres in diameter, while a crater is less than kilometres. The outcomes of Chandrayaan-3 are presumed to promote our known information regarding the formation of the Moon and the geological events associated with it and could prove beneficial for lunar science and exploration missions.
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