Moon May Be Rusting Along Poles, Suggest Chandrayaan-1 Images

Context:

Recent images sent by Chandrayaan-1, India’s first lunar mission, suggest that the Moon may be rusting along the poles.

Chandrayaan-1

• Chandrayaan-1 was the first Indian lunar probe under the Chandrayaan program. It was launched by the Indian Space Research Organisation in October 2008.
• Chandrayaan-1 orbiter, which discovered water ice and mapped out a variety of minerals while surveying the Moon’s surface in 2008.
• Among its suite of instruments, it carried NASA’s Moon Mineralogy Mapper (M3), an imaging spectrometer that helped confirm the discovery of water locked in minerals on the Moon.

More about the discovery

• The new research suggests that the moon is turning slightly red, indicating the formation of a reddish-black mineral form of iron named hematite on its surface, particularly at the poles.
• The formation of rust or iron oxide can be attributed to the presence of two key elements—water and oxygen—when they come in contact with iron.
• The lunar surface is littered with iron-rich rocks, which may facilitate this chemical reaction when combined with the other two elements.

The rusting chemistry

• Rust is the common name for iron oxide. The most familiar form of rust is the reddish coating that forms flakes on iron and steel (Fe2O3), but rust also comes in other colors including yellow, brown, orange, and even green
• For iron to become iron oxide, three things are required:
  • Iron
  • Water
  • Oxygen
• Rust forms when iron or its alloys are exposed to moist air. The oxygen and water in the air react with the metal to form the hydrated oxide.