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Today, we have a glimpse of the recovery of heat recordings from NASA's Apollo Moon missions in 1971 and 1972. A study published this week explored the data of the sensors installed on the Moon of Earth during these missions. data for the first time, publicly. The study is both engaging and boring, inspiring and totally unspectacular. Let's talk about why all this is good.
What was the mystery?
Probes were installed on our moon in 1971 and 1972 by NASA's Apollo 15 and Apollo 17 missions. The first of these probes began recording data in 1971 and both recorded data up to 1977. The great mystery appeared in the early 2000s: data from the years 1975, 76 and 77 did not occur. have never been properly archived.
In addition, there appeared to be a significant increase in heat detected from the beginning of the study and up to 1974.
ABOVE: "Figure 4. ( left) Photograph of astronaut James Irwin showing the borestem and cable of the Apollo 15 Probe 1 protruding from the ground Around the borestem, we can see the footprints of the astronauts.Note that the top of the borestem is left open.The original photo was obtained from NASA, https://www.hq.nasa.gov/alsj/a15/AS15-92-12406HR.jpg. (right) Photograph of Astronaut Harrison Schmidt showing the borestem and cable of the Apollo 17 Probe 2 protruding from the ground.Note the radiation shield attached to the top of the borestem.The original photo was obtained from NASA, https://www.hq.nasa .gov / alsj / a17 / AS17-134-20493HR.jpg. "
Little Green Men?
It is only natural at this point that someone who looks at the situation described above would wonder what is going on. The temperature continued to increase until 1974 – why no other data was officially archived?
Clearly NASA discovered that our moon was melting and wanted to cover that fact! Maybe there were extraterrestrials up there and NASA did not want you and me to know! Or, more likely, the reality of the situation was not so breathtaking.
In reality, the data was still recorded – they simply had not been transferred from their original tape recording material to an appropriate report. The data was not archived correctly because the people who worked on the project did not use the data in their final report. It's not clear WHY they have not used the complete dataset – but that does not seem to have been for any meaningful, malicious or other reason.
Good results are boring
Starting in the year 2010, a new group of researchers began working on the proper archiving of all data that was still relegated to magnetic tape. The band is fine, but it is better to have all the data in one place, just in case some kind of wild result would show up after these last few decades at the shelter.
New research has shown that the rise in temperature continued after 1974 until the end of the study. The temperature rise was consistent with that of the displacement of the surface material (regolith) and the placement of the probes that recorded the data for the study. As the study indicates:
"Simple models of badytical thermal conduction with consistent thermal properties of regolith can show that a steep increase in surface temperature from 1.6 to 3 , 5 K at the time of the deployment of dual-amplitude probe and underground warmings on both Apollo sites. "
Sad science is a happy science
A set of photos confirmed the l & # 39; researchers hypothesis in this study. "Recently acquired images from the lunar reconnaissance camera at both landing sites show that the astronaut trajectories regolith has darkened, lowering the albedo.We suggest that, because of the astronaut activities, solar heat intake by the regolith has increased slightly on average, resulting in observed warming. "
This is not the kind of story that is happening well in our modern internet-friendly news environment. Without the mystery of the supposed missing data points, there would be very little for the average person who loves the hype.
Lucky us There are still scientists in this world who are seeing situations like this and are making the effort to do the noble work of entry and d & # 39; data badysis without interest. Praise to their tireless and dedicated hearts at their work
You can learn more about this topic in the article "Examining the long-term underground warming observed at the Apollo 15 and 17 sites using data from the 39, experience of newly restored heat flux from 1975 to 1977 "at the Journal of Geophysical Research of the American Geophysical Union of Wiley. This article can be found with the code DOI: 10.1029 / 2018JE005579 and the authors include S. Nagihara W.S. Kiefer, P.T. Taylor, D.R. Williams and Y. Nakamura.
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