See more from this Division: Pardee Keynote Sessions
See more from this Session: Return to the Moon: A New Era of Lunar Exploration
Abstract:
With higher energies of impacts, the soil is melted, and the temperatures generated can cause the super-heated melt to partially volatize. These vapors deposit as rims and rinds on the grains of many soil particles, as a silica-rich glass with a plethora of nano-sized, not connected, metallic Fe grains. With continued comminution and melting, particularly of this brittle glass, the nanophase Fe increases such that the finer size-fractions of the soil greatly increase in this impact-glass with its nanophase Fe. The presence of this nanophase metallic Fe in all lunar soils imparts unique properties many of which we are only recently beginning to appreciate. This ubiquitous metallic Fe gives the lunar soil unexpected ferromagnetic properties, useful for transporting lunar regolith. The microwave coupling of the nanophase Fe also can be used for road building, shelters, and landing pad construction.
See more from this Division: Pardee Keynote Sessions
See more from this Session: Return to the Moon: A New Era of Lunar Exploration