The near side of Earth’s Moon as seen using data from cameras aboard NASA’s robotic lunar rover… [+] Reconnaissance Orbiter spacecraft.
Credit: NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center/Arizona State University
NASA’s Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) spacecraft discovered a crater near a pit in the moon’s room-temperature Sea of Tranquility. A thermal camera aboard LRO found that a 328-foot-deep depression the length and width of a football field has shaded areas that maintain a constant, pleasantly cool temperature of about 63 degrees Fahrenheit.
The hope is that future astronauts will be able to use such pits as refuges from the extreme temperatures of the lunar surface, which can range between 260 degrees Fahrenheit during the lunar day and cool to minus 280 degrees Fahrenheit during the lunar night.
First discovered on the moon in 2009, such pits, underground lava tunnels and caves can also offer some protection from cosmic rays, solar radiation and micrometeorites, NASA says.
“About 16 of the more than 200 pits are likely collapsed lava tubes,” Tyler Horvath, a doctoral student in planetary sciences at UCLA and lead author of a paper detailing the study in the journal Geophysical Research Letters, said in a statement.
Horvath processed data from the spacecraft’s Diviner Lunar Radiometer experiment — a thermal imaging camera — to find out if the temperature in the pits differs from that on the surface, NASA says.
An amazing view from high sun to the Mare Tranquillitatis crater, revealing boulders of otherwise … [+] smooth floor. Image is 400 meters wide, north is up, NAC M126710873R.
Credit: NASA/GSFC/Arizona State University.
“The pit’s thermal environment is more hospitable than anywhere else on the Moon, with temperatures varying a minimum of about 63 degrees Fahrenheit anywhere the sun does not shine directly,” the authors write.
The Tranquillitatis crater is located at a near-equatorial latitude of 8.334°N and is the warmest spot on the lunar night, the authors note.
But once inside the pit, the further away from the actual vent and into a potential cave or lava tube system, the more stable the temperatures become, Horvath told me.
Would such pits also protect astronauts from high-energy radiation?
Absolutely high-energy light (such as X-rays or gamma rays) and high-energy particles (alpha and beta particles) cannot penetrate that deeply into the lunar surface, says Horvath. A cave emanating from the Tranquillitatis Pit appears to be 60 meters below the surface, giving the rock enough room to protect you, he says.
Will creating a habitat in a shadowy lava crater save energy?
Keeping the heat that humans and robots need to survive costs a lot of energy, and during the day we can easily use the sun’s energy to regulate temperatures, says Horvath. During the two-week lunar night, however, we have to either produce it ourselves or have enough supplies to survive for two weeks, he says.
By placing your habitat in a moon cave, you almost completely eliminate the need to regulate the temperature, and that dramatically reduces your energy needs, says Horvath.
What next?
This research was originally in support of MoonDiver, a proposed lunar rover mission that would descend along the walls of the Tranquillitatis crater and take measurements of individual lava flows in the crater wall, Horvath says. Hopefully, MoonDiver will be selected the next time NASA solicits mission proposals, he says.
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