MIT-Led Mission Reveals the Moon's Battered Crust Is Riddled With Cracks

A reader sends this quote from the Boston Globe: "The moon's battered crust is riddled with deep fractures that may extend miles underground, according to the first findings from two NASA spacecraft orbiting Earth's nearest neighbor. The results of the mission, led by a Massachusetts Institute of Technology scientist, surprised researchers, who said it will provide new insight into the evolution of the early solar system, and even help inform the search for life on Mars. Announced Wednesday, the discoveries are also a reminder that the familiar moon still holds secrets four decades after NASA ended its manned missions there. 'We have known that the moon's crust and other planetary crusts have been bombarded by impacts, but none of us could have predicted just how cracked the lunar crust is,' said Maria Zuber, the MIT geoscientist who led the mission, called GRAIL." Here are the abstracts from the three studies published in Science.

Re:No plate tectonics.

[AK Marc]

I think it cooled before (or as) it was tidally locked to Earth. So the cracks could be remnants of tidal forces, not cooling. Not that the difference is important, but it may help for learning history of plants/moons.

Re:Moon riddled with cracks

[Anonymous Coward]

Except that Pangaea was not the only super-continent, there have been several over the geological history we've worked out, and hints that they go further back before that too. It would seem to be an odd coincidence that an asteroid his Earth shortly after every super-continent was formed leading to another break up, as opposed to the same forces that created the continent being able to break it up again..