The last time human feet touched the moon was in 1972 and when those astronauts returned they brought back valuable samples taken from Earth’s only natural satellite. Now, more than 50 years later, those samples are still providing scientific insights and recently researchers uncovered a whopper about the Moon we thought we knew so well.
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00:00 [Music]
00:03 The last time human feet touched the moon was in 1972,
00:07 and when those astronauts returned, they brought back valuable samples taken from Earth's only natural satellite.
00:12 Now, more than 50 years later, those samples are still providing scientific insights.
00:16 And recently, researchers uncovered a whopper about the moon we thought we knew so well.
00:20 According to new estimates derived from those very reanalyzed samples,
00:24 the moon is likely some 40 million years older than we previously thought.
00:28 When Apollo 17 astronauts last returned from the lunar surface, they brought back 240 pounds of material.
00:34 The analysis of those materials continues today,
00:36 and recently scientists used new atom probe techniques on zircon mineral samples.
00:40 Here's UCLA planetary scientist, Vidong Zhang, to explain.
00:44 We counted the atom position one by one to see where they are.
00:49 Then we confirmed that the age of the mineral was authentic.
00:55 The researchers say that the moon is of particular interest to scientists,
00:59 as it has an extremely stable environment, meaning they can tell a lot about the Earth's past
01:03 by looking at the moon, since it doesn't have weather and other destabilizing geological activities.
01:08 So it's a key recorder of a lot of events that were not recorded on Earth.
01:14 So knowing the crystallization or the solidification of the lunar surface,
01:19 we are able to know a lot of things about our own home, Earth.
01:24 [music]