China discovers that the dark side of the moon is colder than it was imagined

We all the time see the same side of the Moon, and the other side, called the far side of the Moon, is being explored by the Chinese Space Agency with the mission Chang & # 39; e 4 since January of this year, consisting of a stationary probe and an exploratory rover. And having grown cotton swabs on the spot, the mission has now discovered that the lunar nights in this hemisphere were even colder than we had imagined.

A lunar night lasts about two weeks on Earth and data from NASA's Apollo missions, pointed out that the temperature of the moon's illuminated surface could reach 127 degrees Celsius during the day and drop to – 173 degrees Celsius at night. And now, Chang's 4 has recorded temperatures of -190 degrees Celsius during the long night on the other side of the moon. Due to such extreme temperatures, the cotton swabs that China has cultivated on the other side of the moon

The general director of the Zhang mission He thinks that this night temperature difference between the side we see since the moon and its farthest side could be linked to "probably a difference in the composition of the lunar soil between its two sides". However, "we still need a more careful badysis" before making such a statement. If this badumption is correct, it is possible that something in the lunar "dirt" will cause the ground to retain less heat at night than the landing sites of the Apollo spacecraft.

This is the first time in the history of space exploration that humanity lands a ship on the side.

This is the first time in the history of space exploration that humanity has landed from a ship on the far side of the moon, which until then was only studied with the Orbital flights and probes that remain in the orbit of the moon. Thus, any scientific data obtained by the Chinese mission is singular and valuable to understand even better the natural satellite that illuminates the night sky of the Earth

Source: Live Science