Orange Soil on the Moon

[PaulaJedi]

** I kindly request that we do not debate about whether or not the moon landing was faked or not.
I would like to discuss the orange soil. Thank you for understanding.



Although much of the moon's soil consists of basaltic and anorthositic rock due to being hit by numerous meteors, it also contains metallic iron (Fe0). Surprisingly, though, orange lunar soil was discovered by astronauts of the Apollo 17 mission inside the Shorty crater. Scientists believe this is a result of volcanic activity 3.64 billion years ago. The lava could have potentially cooled and formed tiny glass beads. Another theory to consider is that the iron oxidized and created this orange color. Obviously, oxygen would have had to play a part in that theory and where would the oxygen have come from?

Here is the video of the discovery:

This a closeup view of the dust particles. The orange ones do look somewhat transparent.



There is, however, some evidence that oxygen once existed on the moon. According to Wikipedia, "Indirect evidence for the giant impact scenario comes from rocks collected during the Apollo Moon landings, which show oxygen isotope ratios nearly identical to those of Earth."

Giant impact hypothesis - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

An isotope is the radioactive form of an element, so the existence of an oxygen isotope implies the existence of oxygen, does it not? This topic could very easily branch off to the discussion of the volcanoes, the existence of an atmosphere on the moon, etc.

What do you think?

 

[Martian]

Oxygen is actually extremely common, both on the moon and beyond, just not in its pure form, due to its reactivity. Moon rocks consist of various silicates, which all contain oxygen atoms as part of their makeup. Freeing that oxygen from its bound state within such molecules in order to make use of it takes quite a bit of energy, though. There probably wouldn't be any gaseous oxygen on earth if not for the magnetic field.

 

[PaulaJedi]

Oxygen is actually extremely common, both on the moon and beyond, just not in its pure form, due to its reactivity. Moon rocks consist of various silicates, which all contain oxygen atoms as part of their makeup. Freeing that oxygen from its bound state within such molecules in order to make use of it takes quite a bit of energy, though. There probably wouldn't be any gaseous oxygen on earth if not for the magnetic field.

So oxidizing iron would be no big surprise, then? That's disappointing. I was at least hoping for a long discussion about it! lol.

 

[Martian]

Oxygen is actually extremely common, both on the moon and beyond, just not in its pure form, due to its reactivity. Moon rocks consist of various silicates, which all contain oxygen atoms as part of their makeup. Freeing that oxygen from its bound state within such molecules in order to make use of it takes quite a bit of energy, though. There probably wouldn't be any gaseous oxygen on earth if not for the magnetic field.

So oxidizing iron would be no big surprise, then? That's disappointing. I was at least hoping for a long discussion about it! lol.

Oops. lol

I suppose it really depends on the moon's history. It is remarkable that lunar regolith and terrestrial rocks have identical isotopic compositions, implying they came from the same source. I would actually expect the moon to be more radioactive, since I'm fairly certain it doesn't have an ionosphere to protect it from cosmic rays and solar wind. I suppose the more reactive nuclides would have interacted with cosmic rays long ago and decayed to more stable isotopes.

Here's an idea to consider, regarding the formation of rust on the moon. Suppose there was a mixture of iron and various silicates, sitting there happily minding their own business. Normally, it would probably take a few electron volts to dissociate a silicate molecule into its constituent atoms. However, incoming cosmic rays are typically measured in MeV (millions of electron volts). Basically, it's enough energy to break apart molecules and reform them. Some radioactive minerals on earth exhibit a breakdown of their crystal lattice due to collisions with high speed particles. It's not much per collision, but it adds up over time. If this happened on the moon and even just a small portion of the molecules broke apart and recombined to form water, it could produce rust, even if there's otherwise no water to be found on the moon.

Also remember that meteors can contain ice.

What do you think?