Origin of the Moon

The Earth-Moon system is unusual in several respects. The Moon is roughly 1/4 the radius of the Earth - a larger satellite-to-planet size ratio than all known satellites other than Pluto's Charon. The Moon has a tiny core, perhaps with only ~1% of its mass, in contrast to Earth whose core conta...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:arXiv.org 2021-03
Main Authors: Canup, Robin M, Righter, Kevin, Dauphas, Nicolas, Pahlevan, Kaveh, Ćuk, Matija, Lock, Simon J, Stewart, Sarah T, Salmon, Julien, Rufu, Raluca, Nakajima, Miki, Magna, Tomáš
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Angular momentum
Charon
Earth
Earth-Moon system
Magma
Pluto
Pluto (dwarf planet)
Pluto satellites
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Summary:The Earth-Moon system is unusual in several respects. The Moon is roughly 1/4 the radius of the Earth - a larger satellite-to-planet size ratio than all known satellites other than Pluto's Charon. The Moon has a tiny core, perhaps with only ~1% of its mass, in contrast to Earth whose core contains nearly 30% of its mass. The Earth-Moon system has a high total angular momentum, implying a rapidly spinning Earth when the Moon formed. In addition, the early Moon was hot and at least partially molten with a deep magma ocean. Identification of a model for lunar origin that can satisfactorily explain all of these features has been the focus of decades of research.
ISSN:2331-8422