How did the moon form and how old is it? The most precise dating yet of Earth's largest satellite found that it is much older than previously thought.
Thanks to one of the slowest-ticking clocks in the universe, scientists have determined the moon is about 40 million years older than previously thought.
As the moon’s mantle cooled, it formed tiny zircon crystals, some of the hardiest objects in the universe. Fused from zirconium, oxygen, and silicon, the crystals sometimes contain other elements, such as uranium. If so, they can be used to date when the crystal originally formed, going back billions of years, if necessary.While the above theory of the moon's formation is the most popular and enjoys the greatest evidence, it's not the only one out there.
Scientists have dated the moon to at least 4.46 billion years old. To date the moon, the researchers obtained lunar dust collected by Apollo 17 in 1972 and analyzed the tiny zircon crystals and uranium contained inside. As they expected, not all of it had decayed into lead, a process that takes billions of years.
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