Technical Program > Symposia > Session P2

Pardee Keynote Symposium P2

Evolving Moon: Recent Advances in Understanding our Planetary Neighbor from NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter and Other Missions

Mon., 1 Nov., 1:30–5:30 p.m.
David A. Williams
Sponsored by GSA Planetary Geology Division

This session will highlight recent discoveries from the latest generation of spacecraft exploring the Moon. The latest results will be placed in the ongoing context of both continued global mapping and planning for future robotic and human surface exploration. Speakers will be drawn from the major science teams from all the currently or recently operating missions. The opening talks will provide a context based on long term mapping from orbit by LRO and the Indian Chandrayaan-1 and Japanese Kaguya spacecraft (which have US geologists as participants), and an overview of results from the LCROSS impact. The subsequent talks will look at emerging revelations provided by the high resolution stereo camera, visible/near-IR/thermal-IR spectrometers, and the radar instruments on LRO and Chandrayaan-1. “Evolving Moon” will provide an opportunity for participants to “come up to speed” with the state of lunar exploration, to become aware of the many recent exciting and sometimes surprising results, and to establish a context for the continuing and increasing flow of new information about the Moon.

This image of the moon is from NASA's Moon Mineralogy Mapper on the Indian Space Research Organization's Chandrayaan-1 mission. It is a three-color composite of reflected near-infrared radiation from the sun, and illustrates the extent to which different materials are mapped across the side of the moon that faces Earth. Small amounts of water and hydroxyl (blue) were detected on the surface of the moon at various locations. This image illustrates their distribution at high latitudes toward the poles. Blue shows the signature of water and hydroxyl molecules as seen by a highly diagnostic absorption of infrared light with a wavelength of three micrometers. Green shows the brightness of the surface as measured by reflected infrared radiation from the sun with a wavelength of 2.4 micrometers, and red shows an iron-bearing mineral called pyroxene, detected by absorption of 2.0-micrometer infrared light. Image Credit:  ISRO/NASA/JPL-Caltech/Brown Univ./USGS Click on photo for larger image.

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