Open Access
Major Lunar Crustal Terranes: Surface Expressions and Crust-Mantle Origins
Bradley L. Jolliff,Jeffrey J. Gillis,Larry A. Haskin,Randy L. Korotev,Mark A. Wieczorek +4 more
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TLDR
In this paper, global geochemical information derived from Clementine multispectral data and Lunar Prospector gamma-ray data reveals at least three distinct provinces whose geochemistry and petrologic history make them geologically unique: (1) the Procellarum KREEP Terrane (PKT), (2) the Feldspathic High-lands terrane (FHT), and (3) the South Pole-Aitken Terane (SPAT).Abstract:
In light of global remotely sensed data, the igneous crust of the Moon can no longer be viewed as a simple, globally stratified cumulus structure, composed of a flotation upper crust of anorthosite underlain by progressively more mafic rocks and a residual-melt (KREEP) sandwich horizon near the base of the lower crust. Instead, global geochemical information derived from Clementine multispectral data and Lunar Prospector gamma-ray data reveals at least three distinct provinces whose geochemistry and petrologic history make them geologically unique: (1) the Procellarum KREEP Terrane (PKT), (2) the Feldspathic High-lands Terrane (FHT), and (3) the South Pole-Aitken Terrane (SPAT). The PKT is a mafic province, coincident with the largely resurfaced area in the Procellarum-Imbrium region whose petrogenesis relates to the early differentiation of the Moon. Here, some 40% of the Th in the Moon's crust is concentrated into a region that constitutes only about 10% of the crustal volume. This concentration of Th (average ∼5 ppm), and by implication the other heat producing elements, U and K, led to a fundamentally different thermal and igneous evolution within this region compared to other parts of the lunar crust. Lower-crustal materials within the PKT likely interacted with underlying mantle materials to produce hybrid magmatism, leading to the magnesian suite of lunar rocks and possibly KREEP basalt. Although rare in the Apollo sample collection, widespread mare volcanic rocks having substantial Th enrichment are indicated by the remote data and may reflect further interaction between enriched crustal residues and mantle sources. The FHT is characterized by a central anorthositic region that constitutes the remnant of an anorthositic craton resulting from early lunar differentiation. Basin impacts into this region do not excavate significantly more mafic material, suggesting a thickness of tens of kilometers of anorthositic crust. The feldspathic lunar meteorites may represent samples from the anorthositic central region of the FHT. Ejecta from deep-penetrating basin impacts outside of the central anorthositic region, however, indicate an increasingly mafic composition with depth. The SPAT, a mafic anomaly of great magnitude, may include material of the upper mantle as well as lower crust; thus it is designated a separate terrane. Whether the SPA basin impact simply uncovered lower crust such as we infer for the FHT remains to be determined.read more
Citations
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Journal ArticleDOI
The Constitution and Structure of the Lunar Interior
Mark A. Wieczorek,Bradley L. Jolliff,Amir Khan,Matthew E. Pritchard,Benjamin P. Weiss,James G. Williams,Lon L. Hood,Kevin Righter,Clive R. Neal,Charles K. Shearer,I. Stewart McCallum,Stephanie Tompkins,B. Ray Hawke,C. A. Peterson,Jeffrey J. Gillis,Ben Bussey +15 more
TL;DR: The current state of understanding of the lunar interior is the sum of nearly four decades of work and a range of exploration programs spanning that same time period as discussed by the authors, which is the framework that unifies our knowledge of the structure and composition of the Moon.
Journal ArticleDOI
Thermal and Magmatic Evolution of the Moon
Charles K. Shearer,Paul C. Hess,Mark A. Wieczorek,Matthew E. Pritchard,E. Mark Parmentier,Lars E. Borg,John Longhi,Linda T. Elkins-Tanton,Clive R. Neal,I. Antonenko,Robin M. Canup,Alex N. Halliday,Timothy L. Grove,Bradford H. Hager,Der-Chuen Lee,Uwe Wiechert +15 more
TL;DR: The early views of the Moon manifested in mythology and art throughout the world were primarily tied to lunar and terrestrial cycles and the relationships between the Sun and the Moon as mentioned in this paper, and many of these early views were associated with the violent or catastrophic events in which the Moon was expunged from the Earth.
Journal ArticleDOI
Gravity field of the Moon from the Gravity Recovery and Interior Laboratory (GRAIL) mission.
Maria T. Zuber,David E. Smith,Michael Watkins,Sami W. Asmar,Alexander S. Konopliv,Frank G. Lemoine,H. Jay Melosh,Gregory A. Neumann,Roger J. Phillips,Sean C. Solomon,Sean C. Solomon,Mark A. Wieczorek,James G. Williams,Sander Goossens,Gerhard Kruizinga,Erwan Mazarico,Ryan S. Park,Dah-Ning Yuan +17 more
TL;DR: The Moon's gravity field reveals that impacts have homogenized the density of the crust and fractured it extensively, and GRAIL elucidates the role of impact bombardment in homogenizing the distribution of shallow density anomalies on terrestrial planetary bodies.
Journal ArticleDOI
Elemental composition of the lunar surface: Analysis of gamma ray spectroscopy data from Lunar Prospector
Thomas H. Prettyman,Justin J. Hagerty,R. C. Elphic,W. C. Feldman,David J. Lawrence,G. W. McKinney,David T. Vaniman +6 more
TL;DR: In this article, a linear spectral mixing is used to model the observed gamma ray spectrum for each map pixel and the spectral shape for each elemental constituent is determined by a Monte Carlo radiation transport calculation.
Book ChapterDOI
Stratigraphy and Isotope Ages of Lunar Geologic Units: Chronological Standard for the Inner Solar System
Dieter Stöffler,Graham Ryder +1 more
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors derived the ages of the multi-ring basins and their related ejecta blankets and presented alternative ages for the basin events (in parentheses): 3.92 ± 0.05 Gyr for Nectaris, 3.89 ± 0.02 Gyr (or 3.84 ± 0., 0.04 Gyr), 3.75 ± 0, 0.41 ± 0, 3.30 ± 0 and 3.15 ± 0).
References
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Journal ArticleDOI
Abundances of the elements: Meteoritic and solar
Edward Anders,Nicolas Grevesse +1 more
TL;DR: In this article, new abundance tables have been compiled for C1 chondrites and the solar photosphere and corona, based on a critical review of the literature to mid-1988.
Journal ArticleDOI
Abundance and Distribution of Iron on the Moon
TL;DR: The determined iron content of the lunar highlands crust supports the hypothesis that much of the Moon's crust was derived from a magma ocean and suggests that the bulk composition of the moon differs from that of the Earth's mantle.
Journal ArticleDOI
The Clementine Mission to the Moon: Scientific Overview
Stewart Nozette,P. Rustan,L. P. Pleasance,D. M. Horan,P. Regeon,Eugene M. Shoemaker,Paul Spudis,C. Acton,Daniel N. Baker,J. E. Blamont,Bonnie J. Buratti,M. P. Corson,Merton E. Davies,Thomas C. Duxbury,Eric M. Eliason,Bruce M. Jakosky,Joseph F. Kordas,Isabella T. Lewis,C. L. Lichtenberg,Paul G. Lucey,Erick Malaret,M. A. Massie,J. H. Resnick,C. J. Rollins,Hye-Sook Park,Alfred S. McEwen,Robert E. Priest,Carle M. Pieters,R. A. Reisse,Mark S. Robinson,Richard A. Simpson,David E. Smith,T. C. Sorenson,R. W. Vorder Breugge,Maria T. Zuber +34 more
TL;DR: In the course of 71 days in lunar orbit, from 19 February to 3 May 1994, the Clementine spacecraft acquired just under two million digital images of the moon at visible and infrared wavelengths, enabling the global mapping of the rock types of the lunar crust and the first detailed investigation of the geology of the Lunar polar regions and the lunar far side.
Journal ArticleDOI
The Shape and Internal Structure of the Moon from the Clementine Mission
TL;DR: Global topographic and gravitational field models derived from data collected by the Clementine spacecraft reveal a new picture of the shape and internal structure of the moon, indicating that the structure and thermal history of the Moon are more complex than was previously believed.
Journal ArticleDOI
A model for the thermal and chemical evolution of the Moon's interior: implications for the onset of mare volcanism
Paul C. Hess,E. M. Parmentier +1 more
TL;DR: In this paper, the chemical and thermal consequences of an internal evolution model accounting for the possible role of these sources of chemical buoyancy are explored. But the model is not suitable for the case of high-TiO2 mare basalts.
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