What is the massive metal thing under the surface of the moon?

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Scientists detect a huge underground metal anomaly in a crater on the moon.
"Whatever it is, wherever it comes from," it seems like it's billions of years old.
His Probably the remains of an asteroid that hit the moon.

"Imagine taking a bunch of metal five times bigger than the Big Island of Hawaii and burying it underground. That's about the unexpected mass we've detected." This is Peter B. James from Baylor University who talks about a gigantic anomaly discovered beneath the surface of the Moon. He is the principal author of a study published in Geophysical Research Letters describing the strange discovery. There are some theories about what this could be.

Mystery mass

Image Source: CNSA / CLEP

The Chinese Yutu-2 rover is leaving the Chang-e-4 lander located on the other side of the moon.

The thing is under the lunar basin of the South Aitken Pole, considered the largest intact crater in our solar system. It is thought that the oval feature dates back about 4 billion years and that it is large: about 2,000 kilometers wide in some places. Located on the other side of the moon, it can not be seen directly from the Earth. Even in this case, James calls it, "one of the best natural laboratories for studying catastrophic events, an ancient process that has shaped all the planets and rocky moons we see today."

While studying the watershed, James and his colleagues studied data from NASA's Gravity Recovery and Interior Laboratory (GRAIL) to document changes in the intensity of the Moon's gravity. "When we combined this data with lunar topographic data from the lunar reconnaissance Orbiter," said James, "we discovered an unexpected mass of hundreds of kilometers under the South Pole-Aitken basin." It says "it does not matter what it is, where it comes from", it lowers the crater floor by more than one kilometer.

So, what is it?

Peter B. James.

Image Source: Baylor University

Peter B. James.

The two most likely theories are that it is the iron-nickel core of an old asteroid impact or a remnant of dense oxides from the cooling of the magma of the Moon. Or, of course, a giant spaceship or a hidden underground civilization, ahem.

James said: "We did the math and showed that a sufficiently dispersed asteroid nucleus that had caused the impact could remain suspended under the mantle of the Moon until nowadays. , rather than sinking in the center of the moon. "

This is an intriguing discovery and, with ongoing international efforts to study the far-flung face of the moon – such as the Chinese mission Chang-e 4 – we are looking forward to new information on this huge anomaly.