NASA’s finding of water on sunlit side of moon builds on research from Chandrayaan-1

NASA’s finding of water on sunlit side of moon builds on research from Chandrayaan-1

NASA’s Stratospheric Observatory for Infrared Astronomy (Sofia) on Monday confirmed the presence of water on the sunlit surface of the moon. The water was detected in the Clavius Crater, one of the largest craters visible from Earth, indicating the water is present across the lunar surface and not restricted to the cold, shadowed places. This discovery—if the water is easily accessible—would help in the US mission Artemis that plans to send humans to the moon again by 2024. No human has been on the moon since 1972; there were six Apollo missions that sent humans to moon. The second race for lunar exploration was prompted by India’s first mission to moon—Chandrayaan-1—which is credited with the discovery of water ice or a chemical relative hydroxyl (OH). Twelve years ago, on November 14, India dropped an impactor probe from its satellite in the lunar orbit. The probe—which had a spectrometer on board—detected the presence of molecules with oxygen and hydrogen bonding in the atmosphere, c…