Evidence of volcano activity found on Moon

Latest reports have emerged that scientists have found evidence of volcano activity on the surface of the far side of the Moon.

The Nature Geoscience journal has reported the rare example of volcano activity on the surface, not associated with asteroid, comet or meteor impact events. There are examples of similar activity on the near side in a region called the ‘Procellarum KREEP terrane'.

Scientists focused on a section of the surface which contains domes, some of which are over six kilometers high.

The leader of the scientists Bradley Joliff, from Washington University in St Louis said the domes are “volcanic in origin and formed from viscous lava.”

Discovery News spoke with Sarah Maddison, who is a professor of Astrophysics at Swinburne University in Melbourne and she said “Most of the volcanism we see on the moon is impact related and on the near side, although we don't know why. But if it's caused by radioactive decay, then why is it limited to the one hot spot and why did it happen so much later than everywhere else on the moon?”

Kitguru says: A breakthrough discovery, but it asks a lot of questions which have yet to be answered.

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