For the first meter , a collaborative team of space scientists has completely mapped the geology and surface of the Moon now furnish a “ unlined ” and “ globally consistent ” picture of our artificial satellite throughout its 4.5 - billion - year - old history .
And no , it ’s still not made of cheese .
The aptly named “ Unified Geologic Map of the Moon ” uniformly shows ten of lunar entropy at a musical scale of 1 - to-5 million , capturing the many facets of the lunar geology , from craters and basins to lunar plains and volcanic features .
direct by the US Geological Society ( USGS ) in collaboration with NASA and the Lunar Planetary Institute , the projection culled selective information from six regional lunar function taken during the Apollo - era for comparison against update information collect during recent planet missions to the Moon .
Merging older and new data allowed for the squad to redrew existing historic maps creating consistency across careen names , their layer , descriptions , and ages in what is now a unified verbal description of our closest celestial neighbor .
“ This map is a climax of a decades - long projection , ” said Corey Fortezzo , USGS geologist and lead author . “ It cater vital information for young scientific study by link the exploration of specific site on the Moon with the relief of the lunar Earth’s surface . ”
In total , there were more than 200 unit across six mathematical function , some of which were exactly the same and others that were entirely dissimilar , which allow researcher to forge a “ global social unit scheme for sew together and correlating each unit . The final map lie of 43 unit across the intact lunar open , break down into groups base on their attributes , now described in apapersubmitted to the51st Lunar and Planetary Science Conferenceat the Lunar and Planetary Institute in Texas
Scientists say that the map will serve as the definitive blueprint for studying lunar aerofoil geology and will inform future human missions as well as lend brainwave for great scientific understanding .
" masses have always been fascinate by the Moon and when we might return , " sound out current USGS Director and former NASA spaceman Jim Reilly in astatement . " So , it ’s wonderful to see USGS make a resource that can help oneself NASA with their planning for future missions . "
The map will next be reconcile for publication as aUSGS Open File Reportand will include a function writeup with more detailed methodologies and description . A more detailed version of the map can be viewedhere .
