India's Chandrayaan-1 lunar mission discovered that high-energy electrons from Earth may be producing water on the Moon

A team of scientists studying data from India's Chandrayaan-1 lunar mission discovered that high-energy electrons from Earth may be producing water on the Moon.

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Nature Astronomy reported the research findings.According to the news agency PTI, researchers from the University of Hawaii (UH) in the United States revealed that electrons in "Earth's plasma sheet" are contributing to weathering processes — the breaking down or dissolving of rocks and minerals — on the Moon's surface.

According to the findings, these electrons may have contributed in the development of water on the lunar body.

Solar Wind believed to be one of the key ways water developed on the Moon

Solar wind, which is made up of high-energy particles like protons, now hits the lunar surface and is believed to be one of the key ways water developed on the Moon.

Although we have verified the importance of solar wind as a key source of fast water creation on the Moon, previously undetected features of the plasma sheet qualities may also play an essential role, according to the study's abstract.

Knowing the amounts and distributions of water on the Moon, according to the experts, is crucial to understanding its genesis and history, as well as supplying water resources for human exploration in the future.

The new discovery may assist to explain the formation of the water ice previously identified in the Moon's permanently shadowed areas.

Chandrayaan 1 played a key role in finding of water molecules on the Moon

Chandrayaan-1, the first Indian lunar probe launched as part of the Chandrayaan programme, was instrumental in the finding of water molecules on the Moon. It was first introduced in 2008.

The researchers studied how the Moon's surface weathering varies when it travels through Earth's magnetotail. The magnetotail is a region that almost fully shelters the lunar body from solar wind but not from photons from the Sun.

What studies say about this Finding?

This provides a natural laboratory for researching the mechanisms of lunar surface water creation, according to Shuai Li, an assistant researcher at the UH Manoa School of Ocean.

Li went on to say that when the Moon is outside of the magnetotail, it is struck with solar wind. There are essentially no solar wind protons inside the magnetotail, and water production is projected to be nearly nonexistent, according to the study.

Li and colleagues then examined remote sensing data provided by India's Chandrayaan 1 mission's Moon Mineralogy Mapper instrument, an imaging spectrometer, between 2008 and 2009.

They examined the changes in water creation as the Moon passed through Earth's magnetotail, which consists of the plasma sheet.

Surprisingly, remote sensing investigations revealed that water creation in Earth's magnetotail is nearly equivalent to the time when the Moon was outside the magnetotail, according to Li.

This suggests that there may be additional creation processes or novel sources of water in the magnetotail that are not directly related to the implantation of solar wind protons. He explained that radiation from high energy electrons, in particular, has similar effects to solar wind protons.

The researchers went on to say that this discovery, together with the team's prior investigation of rusty lunar poles, show that the Earth is inextricably linked to its Moon in many hitherto unknown ways.

The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) launched Chandrayaan 1 in October 2008 and operated it till August 2009. An orbiter and an impactor were part of the mission.

Last month, India became the first country to successfully land the Chandrayaan-3 mission, which included a rover and a lander, near the Moon's intriguing south pole.

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