Space Cadets line up for one-way Mars trip

Washington (AFP)
Sept 09, 2013

More than 200,000 people from 140 countries have applied to go to Mars and never return, the group behind an ambitious venture to colonize the inhospitable red planet said Monday.

Bas Lansdorp, a Dutch engineer and entrepreneur, plans to establish a permanent base on Mars in a mission he hopes will take off in 2022 if he can find the necessary $6 billion.

One in four of the 202,586 applicants for the one-way trip are Americans, said Mars One, the non-profit group which initiated its hunt for "would-be Mars settlers" in April.

There are also hopefuls from India (10 percent), China (six percent) and Brazil (five percent), among other countries, it said.

By 2015, Mars One expects put up to 10 four-member teams through intensive training, with the first of those teams reaching to Mars in 2023 on a high-risk journey that would take seven months to complete.

If they survive the trip, the human Martians will have to deal with minus 55 degrees C (minus 67 F) temperatures in a desert-like atmosphere that consists mainly of carbon dioxide.

They'll also have to consent to being observed back on Earth full-time as stars of a reality TV show that would help cover expenses.

The project has the support of Gerard 't Hooft, the Dutch joint winner of the Nobel prize for physics in 1999.

"The long term aim is to have a lasting colony," said 't Hooft in New York in April. "This expansion will not be easy. How soon that will be accomplished is anyone's guess."

Space agencies including NASA have expressed skepticism about the viability of Lansdorp's plan, saying the technology to establish a human colony on Mars does not exist.

Mars One says on its website that the mission is a decade-long endeavor, with funding intended to come from the global audience of an interactive, televised broadcast of every aspect of the mission.

So far, there have only been unmanned missions to Mars undertaken by NASA, which has signaled its intent to send astronauts there within 20 years.

Source: Mars Daily.
Link: http://www.marsdaily.com/reports/Space_Cadets_line_up_for_one-way_Mars_trip_999.html.

India prepares to launch country's maiden mission to Mars

New Delhi (UPI)
Sep 9, 2013

Indian officials have confirmed a November launch date for the country's first mission to Mars, set to launch from a spaceport in the south of the country.

"Hectic preparations are on to launch Indian Space Research Organization's ambitious Mars Orbiter Mission in November," U.R. Rao of the Governing Council of Physical Research Laboratory said.

The Mangalyaan Mars probe will lift off from the Indian Space Research Organization's launch site at Sriharikota, China's Xinhua news agency reported Sunday.

"The Mars Orbiter Mission will be sent through powerful PSLV-XL launch vehicle," Rao said.

A successful launch would make India the sixth country to initiate a mission to Mars after the United States, Russia, Europe, China and Japan.

"The unmanned mission, which will explore the existence of life and the possibility of sustaining life on Mars, will travel 299 days in space before reaching the Red Planet in September 2014," Rao said.

Source: Mars Daily.
Link: http://www.marsdaily.com/reports/India_prepares_to_launch_countrys_maiden_mission_to_Mars_999.html.

Three ISS Crew Land Safely Back On Earth

September 11, 2013

Two Russian cosmonauts and a U.S. astronaut have arrived safely back on Earth after a 166-day mission on the International Space Station.

Outgoing station commander Pavel Vinogradov, NASA astronaut Christopher Cassidy, and Russian cosmonaut Aleksander Misurkin landed in Kazakhstan early on September 11 aboard a Russian Soyuz capsule.

Before leaving, Vinogradov, a veteran of three spaceflights, transferred command of the $100 billion station to fellow cosmonaut Fyodor Yurchikhin, who remains aboard with Italian astronaut Luca Parmitano and NASA's Karen Nyberg.

The space station has been continuously staffed by rotating crews of astronauts and cosmonauts since November 2000.

Based on reporting by Reuters, AFP, and ITAR-TASS

Source: Hispanic Business.
Link: http://www.hispanicbusiness.com/2013/9/11/three_iss_crew_land_safely_back.htm.

'Trojan' asteroids in far reaches of solar system more common than previously thought

Vancouver, Canada (SPX)
Sep 03, 2013

BC astronomers have discovered the first Trojan asteroid sharing the orbit of Uranus, and believe 2011 QF99 is part of a larger-than-expected population of transient objects temporarily trapped by the gravitational pull of the Solar System's giant planets.

Trojans are asteroids that share the orbit of a planet, occupying stable positions known as Lagrangian points. Astronomers considered their presence at Uranus unlikely because the gravitational pull of larger neighboring planets would destabilize and expel any Uranian Trojans over the age of the Solar System.

To determine how the 60 kilometer-wide ball of rock and ice ended up sharing an orbit with Uranus the astronomers created a simulation of the Solar System and its co-orbital objects, including Trojans.

"Surprisingly, our model predicts that at any given time three per cent of scattered objects between Jupiter and Neptune should be co-orbitals of Uranus or Neptune," says Mike Alexandersen, lead author of the study to be published tomorrow in the journal Science. This percentage had never before been computed, and is much higher than previous estimates.

Several temporary Trojans and co-orbitals have been discovered in the Solar System during the past decade. QF99 is one of those temporary objects, only recently (within the last few hundred thousand years) ensnared by Uranus and set to escape the planet's gravitational pull in about a million years.

"This tells us something about the current evolution of the Solar System," says Alexandersen. "By studying the process by which Trojans become temporarily captured, one can better understand how objects migrate into the planetary region of the Solar System."

Source: Space Daily.
Link: http://www.spacedaily.com/reports/Trojan_asteroids_in_far_reaches_of_solar_system_more_common_than_previously_thought_999.html.

New technology could make for smarter planet rovers

Pasadena, Calif. (UPI)
Sep 9, 2013

The Curiosity rover exploring Mars boasts impressive technology but future rovers will need more smarts to explore more distant worlds, U.S. scientists say.

While the unmanned Curiosity mission has made major strides in landing on and finding its own way on a distant planet, new and better technology is needed if future rover missions are to make discoveries further out in the solar system, they said.

One step under way is the development of a new camera that can do more than just take pictures of alien rocks, researchers said; it also thinks about what the pictures signify so the rover can decide on its own whether to keep exploring a particular site or move on.

"We currently have a micromanaging approach to space exploration," Kiri Wagstaff, a computer scientist and geologist at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif., said. "While this suffices for our rovers on Mars, it works less and less well the further you get from the Earth. If you want to get ambitious and go to Europa and asteroids and comets, you need more and more autonomy to even make that feasible."

As part of that goal, Wagstaff and her colleagues have developed an advanced two-lens camera, called TextureCam, with its own computer processor which can analyze images it captures so the rover can decide on its own whether to keep exploring a particular site, or move on.

"Right now for the rovers, each day is planned out on Earth based on the images the rover took the previous day," Wagstaff said. "This is a huge limitation and one of the main bottlenecks for exploration with these spacecraft."

"If the rover itself could prioritize what's scientifically important, it would suddenly have the capability to take more images than it knows it can send back. That goes hand in hand with its ability to discover new things that weren't anticipated," she said.

"You do have to provide it with some initial training, just like you would with a human, where you give it example images of what to look for," Wagstaff said. "But once it knows what to look for, it can make the same decisions we currently do on Earth."

In initial testing, TextureCam was trained using technology similar to the facial unlock feature available on smartphones and computers, and the more examples of interesting rocks it was shown, the better it became at identifying the common features that made the rocks scientifically important, the researchers said.

Wagstaff and her colleagues have reported their developments in the journal Geophysical Research Letters.

Source: Mars Daily.
Link: http://www.marsdaily.com/reports/New_technology_could_make_for_smarter_planet_rovers_999.html.

Navalny defuses anger over Moscow mayor's race

September 09, 2013

MOSCOW (AP) — Opposition leader Alexei Navalny on Monday night defused anger over the Moscow mayoral election, telling a vast square of cheering supporters to celebrate his surprisingly strong second-place finish as a victory that gave rise to real political competition in Russia.

Navalny has claimed that Sunday's vote was manipulated to give the Kremlin-appointed incumbent, Sergei Sobyanin, the slim majority he needed to win in the first round and avoid a runoff. Russia's most respected election monitoring group also questioned the accuracy of the vote.

But rather than call for angry street protests like those he led after the fraud-tainted 2011 national parliamentary election, Navalny urged his supporters to keep up the kind of grassroots political activism that helped him defy all expectations and win 27 percent of the vote.

Sunday's election was in some ways less about Sobyanin, who many agree has brought positive change to Moscow since taking over three years ago, and more about the depth of discontent in the Russian capital with President Vladimir Putin's rule, especially among the young and middle class. Navalny, 37, attracted thousands of enthusiastic volunteers to help him take his campaign to the streets of Moscow.

"During these elections, politics in Russia was finally born," Navalny told the crowd that filled Bolotnaya Square. The Navalny who took the stage Monday night was a more restrained and mature-sounding version of the fiery protest leader who inspired the mass protests against Putin that stretched through the winter of 2012, some of them held on the same square across the river from the Kremlin.

He said the time may come when he will call on his supporters to protest in defiance of police, "to turn over cars and light flares, whatever else," but for now he asked them to keep up their political work through elections.

Monday's rally largely answered the question of how Navalny planned to respond to the election results. The next question is whether the Kremlin remains determined to see him in prison after he won the votes of 630,000 Muscovites.

Navalny was convicted in July of embezzlement in a case seen as part of a Kremlin effort to sideline him, but his strong showing at the polls could lead to a shortening of his five-year sentence, if the Kremlin feels this would help settle discontent.

Nikolai Petrov, a scholar who studies Russian politics, said jailing Navalny now would be sure to trigger huge protests. "I would not expect the Kremlin to do this stupid mistake, although I cannot exclude such" a possibility," Petrov said during a telephone briefing organized by the Wilson Center in Washington.

Golos, Russia's leading independent election monitor, said the voting Sunday appeared to have gone smoothly, but it pointed to violations that could have tipped the balance in favor of Sobyanin, who won with about 51 percent. "Everyone has doubts," Golos executive director Grigory Melkonyants said. "This is not a convincing victory."

Sobyanin, however, told his supporters late Sunday that they should be proud. "We organized the fairest, most competitive and most open elections in the history of Moscow," he said. This mayoral election was the first in Moscow since 2003 and included six candidates. Last year, the Kremlin reversed Putin's 2004 decree abolishing direct elections for Moscow's mayor and other regional leaders.

AP writers Laura Mills and Nataliya Vasilyeva contributed to this report.

Navalny demands recount in Moscow mayoral race

September 09, 2013

MOSCOW (AP) — Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny demanded a recount Monday in Moscow's mayoral election after official results showed that the Kremlin-backed incumbent barely escaped facing him in a runoff. Russia's most respected monitoring group also questioned the accuracy of the vote.

The Moscow Election Commission said Monday that former Kremlin chief of staff Sergei Sobyanin won just over 51 percent of the vote while Navalny garnered 27 percent in second place, a strong result for a Russian opposition leader. If Sobyanin, 55, had won less than 50 percent, he would have faced a runoff with the charismatic 37-year-old Navalny, who has risen to wide prominence in the past few years with his anti-corruption campaign.

"We do not recognize these elections," Navalny told reporters. "Sobyanin can't consider himself the mayor of all Muscovites, he can't consider himself a lawfully elected mayor unless he agrees to our demands and allows a recount of the vote."

Leonid Volkov, chief of Navalny's election campaign, said the key violation they are contesting is the voting-from-home totals, where the vote count showed what he called an abnormally high number of votes for Sobyanin. Those votes are from people considered too infirm to get to polling stations.

Sobyanin, who was appointed Moscow's mayor in 2010, told Russian news agencies that Moscow had "passed the test for free and fair elections." Sunday's election was closely watched around the world amid concerns over the democratic process in Russia and following Navalny's recent conviction for embezzlement, a charge he says was politically motivated.

While Navalny's frustrated supporters were gearing up for a protest rally Monday evening, the activist said he was not seeking to bring unrest to Moscow. Still, he pledged to "participate in acts of civil disobedience" if Sobyanin turned down his offer for talks and a recount.

"Our demands are lawful, we don't plan to kick up a fuss for the sake of it," Navalny said. Golos, Russia's leading independent election monitor, said the voting Sunday appeared to have gone smoothly but pointed to violations that could have tipped the balance in favor of one candidate.

Golos' executive director Grigory Melkonyants said Monday his group's observations indicate the actual tally for Sobyanin was lower than the official result posted by authorities. Aggregated data collected by election observers throughout Moscow and published on Golos' website showed Sobyanin winning only 49.5 percent of the vote — a number that by law would have required a runoff in two weeks among the top two contenders.

"We have results from over 2,000 polling stations, and it's clear that there should be a second round," Melkonyants said. "And yet for some reason, where there aren't any observers, the outcome is different and it changes the overall result. Everyone has doubts. This is clearly not a convincing victory."

This mayoral election was the first in Moscow since 2003 and included six candidates. Last year, the Kremlin reversed President Vladimir Putin's 2004 decree abolishing direct elections for Moscow's mayor and other regional leaders.

Nataliya Vasilyeva contributed to this report.

Navalny shakes up Moscow mayor campaign

August 26, 2013

MOSCOW (AP) — A motley gaggle of hipsters, mothers with children and two babushkas with hair dyed bright red gather to listen to something they haven't heard in over a decade: a stump speech for Moscow mayor.

Alexei Navalny, an anti-corruption blogger who has become the best known face of Russia's protest movement, is trying to take his following offline and into the street, waging a traditional campaign of hand-shaking and leaflet drives to win voters outside his base of the young and web-savvy.

Navalny has little hope of defeating incumbent Sergei Sobyanin — but polls show his star is rising. And if he gets a big chunk of the vote, the Kremlin will face pressure to show leniency over his five-year prison sentence, and the grassroots protest movement that fizzled out after Vladimir Putin's return to the presidency last year may gain new wind.

Sobyanin, meanwhile, is playing the regal incumbent: Throughout the campaign, the Kremlin-backed politician has been all but invisible, allowing the constant drone of jackhammers or whiff of fresh paint that are signs of a Moscow makeover to remind voters of who's in charge — and who can pull the purse-strings.

Navalny is the one who has been soaking up attention, and generating buzz. On a recent August day, the opposition leader stood on stage in a sprawling Moscow park dotted with enormous space shuttles and other scraps of Soviet-era glory, and attempted to connect with an audience he rarely reaches through Twitter: the feared and revered babushka contingency.

"We know that (in Soviet times) our oil money was spent on enormous factories, industry, railroads, roads, science, health care, rockets," he boomed, riffing on a nostalgia felt by many older Russians, who saw their hopes dashed and savings depleted under post-Soviet political reforms.

"But can you name a single major business that's been built in this country in the past 10 years? I can't!" The old ladies sitting in the first row chuckled and shook their heads. On Sunday, police briefly detained Navalny after he left the stage of a campaign event, and released him a short time later. The detention was part of a series of public signals to Navalny, who was given a verbal warning about various alleged campaign violations by the Moscow electoral committee last week.

Polling data on the race is spotty and inconsistent, but the trends are clear: The number of Muscovites ready to vote for Navalny on Sept. 8 has breached 10 percent and may even be moving toward 20 percent. Meanwhile, Sobyanin's ratings — while still above the 50 percent that would allow him to avoid a run-off — are slipping by the week. There are four other party-backed candidates in the race, none projected to snag more than 5 percent.

Alexei Grazhdankin, deputy director of the independent Levada polling center, said that Sobyanin's voter base was clearly no longer growing, and that there's now a small chance there will be a second round.

Last month, Navalny was sentenced to five years in prison on embezzlement charges, but was released the day after his conviction in what many have described as an effort to legitimize the mayoral race and ensure that Sobyanin — who was appointed as mayor and is seen as a possible successor to Putin — is regarded as an elected politician with widespread support.

Such legitimacy is considered important because Putin's forces are at their weakest in his seat of power: Moscow. When Putin won back the presidency last year, after ruling for a term in the lesser role of prime minister, he won only 47 percent of the capital's vote, compared to 64 percent nationwide. That may also be a reason why, although there's no doubt that Sobyanin is the Kremlin's man, he is running as an independent and has avoided public appearances with the president.

Masha Lipman at the Carnegie Endowment in Moscow said that Navalny had already achieved something: cast doubt over the inevitability of Putin's power. "One of his greatest achievements is ... adding an element of risk and uncertainty," she said. "Putin built a political system in this country that is risk averse, it's a political monopoly."

Rather than the issues — immigration, traffic, high cost of living — it's a contrast in political style that lies at the heart of the mayoral campaign. In the Levada Center poll, 48 percent of respondents said they would vote for a mayor with "experience," whereas 47 percent said that personal qualities, such as "openness and determination," were crucial.

Navalny, a sharp-tongued 37-year-old lawyer, has plenty of the latter. He has waged an intensive campaign with nearly $1.5 million in funds raised online, meeting with hundreds of voters every day and mobilizing enthusiastic young volunteers to help hand out leaflets in the street and on the metro.

His team has also unleashed a flurry of new online projects. From a GPS mapping system that shows how many supporters live in each apartment block to an application that helps users spread pro-Navalny information on Russia's biggest social networks, the campaign has been keen to lock down his natural base of young voters, many of whom often don't make it to the polls.

"Currently the polls are assuming that those who haven't yet figured out who to vote for will vote the same way as those who have," Leonid Volkov, Navalny's campaign manager, told The Associated Press. "The fight is for the 30 percent of voters who haven't decided yet."

Andrei Tvertnev, an unemployed 25-year-old former soldier who was lingering in the crowd around Navalny, is one of those yet to make up his mind. Tvertnev wasn't keen on Sobyanin, saying that the changes he's brought to the city "could have been done much faster." At the same time, he remained skeptical about Navalny.

"Do I vote for a bureaucrat who made some changes, or a different person who promises even more changes?" he asked. "I think I'll only make up my mind on the day of the elections." Sobyanin, who made his name as the governor of the oil-rich Siberian province of Tyumen, makes up for his lack of charisma and enthusiasm with what talks in Russian politics: experience, access and the money that comes with it.

Despite his almost invisible candidacy, Sobyanin is genuinely well-liked for the changes he's brought to Moscow. He has poured a yearly budget of approximately $54 billion into the city's parks and cultural institutions, although other promises to tackle traffic and parking have been lagging or limited in scope.

As if to shore up his reputation as a fixer-upper, the city, which usually hits a sleepy summer lull in August, has been converted into an enormous construction site — with sidewalks torn up and facades repainted.

"There's little doubt that before elections, the government becomes very affectionate and thoughtful," Levada's Grazhdankin said about the city's makeover. While Sobyanin, who was appointed to the mayor's office, is eager to prove himself as a legitimately elected politician, the tactics used against Navalny — from accusations that he receives foreign funding abroad to refusals by media outlets to play his campaign ads — show that he still sees Navalny as a threat.

Even if Navalny's eventual vote tally is relatively low, he may end up having an outsized impact on the Russian political scene. "If he gets 10 to 12 percent, they can say, look at your opposition leader, he was only able to get this tiny fraction of the vote," said Lipman. "But those people who are investing their emotions, time and money into this campaign, that experience won't go away."

Oleg Bogomolov, a 42-year-old human resources manager who was at Navalny's headquarters to volunteer for the first time, said he didn't truly believe Navalny could win. "But I think the more people who know about him, the greater his chances of being set free," he said. "If they put him behind bars again (after the election), there will be even more people in the streets."

Iranian ministers open pages on banned Facebook

NASSER KARIMI | AP
Monday 9 September 2013

TEHRAN: Iran’s entire Cabinet has opened Facebook pages in what is seen as a move toward greater government openness — even though the social media site is blocked in the Islamic Republic.

The Facebook pages of 15 ministers could be viewed in Tehran through a proxy server. Newspapers on Monday hinted the move might herald the lifting of some Internet barriers.

“It seems the ‘key’” — Rouhani’s electoral symbol in his presidential campaign — “may turn the lock of (Internet) filtering,” the pro-reform Shargh daily said.

With the exception of Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif, who joined Facebook in 2009, the Cabinet members signed up this August after the inauguration of centrist- and reformist-backed President Hasan Rouhani.

Rouhani’s office has also opened a page on Facebook that was “liked” by all the ministers.

Saeed Leilaz, a Tehran-based political analyst, said it was likely the start of the lifting of Internet “filters,” which block specific sites. “Definitely filtering on Facebook will be lifted, and we will witness the elimination of filters (on the rest of) Internet,” said Leilaz.

Rouhani had promised greater openness and transparency during his presidential campaign in June. The move also suggests that his administration is looking toward social media to push its policies.

Last week, Zarif told a local news website that he sent a message on Twitter saying “Happy Rosh Hashana,” the Jewish new year, in what is likely a small diplomatic step toward easing the hostilities between his nation and Israel.

Iranian hard-liners see the Internet as a possible corrupting force, but many Iranians use proxies to access banned sites.

Iran imposed a ban on Facebook after disputed re-election of former President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in 2009, when his opponents used social media to organize protests.

Earlier in 2012, Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who has final say on all state matters, issued a religious decree in which Facebook was considered permissible if it was not used for corrupting or bad purposes. A page that claims to be Khamenei’s is generally believed to reflect his views. He has neither disowned nor claimed it, and many consider it his unofficial voice.

There are 18 ministers in the cabinet but three nominees of Rouhani failed to receive vote of confidence from parliament in August. The president should introduce their alternatives to the parliament in coming months.

Source: Arab News.
Link: http://www.arabnews.com/news/464034.

Australia's Kevin Rudd concedes election defeat and wishes Tony Abbott well

AFP
Saturday, Sep 07, 2013

SYDNEY - Australia's Labor Prime Minister Kevin Rudd on Saturday conceded election defeat to conservative challenger Tony Abbott, and wished his rival well.

"A short time again I telephoned Tony Abbott to concede defeat at this national election," he said at a party function in Brisbane.

"As prime minister of Australia, I wish him well in the high office of prime minister of this country."

With 80 per cent of the votes counted, the Australian Electoral Commission showed Mr Abbott’s Liberal/National coalition was leading in 88 seats in the House of Representatives, to Labor’s 56.

Mr Rudd said Labor had “fought the good fight”.

“Tonight is the time to unite as the great Australian nation,” he added to a cheering crowd of supporters.

“Because whatever our politics may be we are all first and foremost Australian and the things that unite us are more powerful than the things that divide us, which is why the world marvels at Australia.”

Source: AsiaOne.
Link: http://news.asiaone.com/news/world/australias-kevin-rudd-concedes-election-defeat-and-wishes-tony-abbott-well.

Australia's first woman PM Julia Gillard exits politics

AFP
Saturday, Sep 07, 2013

SYDNEY - Australia's first female prime minister, Julia Gillard, quietly exited politics Saturday, congratulating the woman who has taken over her constituency as Labor faced defeat in national elections.

The 51-year-old opted not to stand in the polls after being dumped as Labor leader in June and has stayed out of the spotlight since.

As election results came in Saturday, she emerged from her self-imposed silence to congratulate the successor in her Melbourne seat of Lalor, Labor candidate Joanne Ryan.

"She'll be a strong and articulate voice for a proud community we both love," Gillard said via her Twitter account.

She became prime minister in 2010 when she led a party room coup against then-Labor leader Kevin Rudd, in a move which shocked the nation but was designed to end months of dysfunction within the government.

Gillard called an election shortly afterwards but her campaign was rocked by leaks and her subsequent three years of minority rule were wracked by Labor infighting which grew more pronounced as she failed to turn around dire polls.

With her popularity at record lows and speculation Rudd would mount a challenge, Gillard called a party room vote in June which she lost 57 votes to 45. She agreed to exit politics at Saturday's election.

Since then, she has kept a low profile, shunning Labor events so as not to prove a distraction from Rudd's campaign.

Prior to her comment on Saturday, her last tweet was on July 11 which said only: "Thanks to all who have sent notes and gifts. Deeply appreciated. Looking forward to time with family. Will see you all down the track."

"She has been a model of dignity," said Haydon Manning, associate professor of politics at Flinders University in South Australia.

"And that sharply contrasts really with the person who replaced her (Rudd) when he was replaced by her.

"She has done nothing to harm Labor's campaign, unlike in 2010 and obviously the campaign has been one of the worst Labor has ever managed to pull off."

For those who believed that Labor would have done better under Gillard, exit polls by Sky News suggested the party would have suffered an even more crushing defeat with her still as leader.

"She grated on people to an extent I have never seen before," former Labor minister and now Sky News commentator Graham Richardson said of Gillard.

With her career in politics finished, Gillard will become an honorary professor at Adelaide University.

Source: AsiaOne.
Link: http://news.asiaone.com/news/world/australias-first-woman-pm-julia-gillard-exits-politics.

Scientists say water on moon may have originated on Earth

London (UPI)
Sep 10, 2013

Water found in ancient Moon rocks might have actually originated on the early Earth and even survived the Moon-forming collision event, British researchers say.

That's the suggestion of Jessica Barnes and colleagues at The Open University who investigated the amount of water present in the mineral apatite, a calcium phosphate mineral found in samples of the ancient lunar crust brought back to earth by the Apollo missions.

"These are some of the oldest rocks we have from the Moon and are much older than the oldest rocks found on Earth," Barnes said. "The antiquity of these rocks make them the most appropriate samples for trying to understand the water content of the Moon soon after it formed about 4.5 billion years ago and for unraveling where in the Solar System that water came from."

Barnes presented the study's finding Monday at the European Planetary Science Congress in London.

The ancient lunar rocks contain appreciable amounts of water locked into the crystal structure of apatite, the researchers said, noting they have measured the hydrogen isotopic signature of the water in these lunar rocks to identify the potential source for the water.

"The water locked into the mineral apatite in the Moon rocks studied has an isotopic signature very similar to that of the Earth and some carbonaceous chondrite meteorites," Barnes said.

"The remarkable consistency between the hydrogen composition of lunar samples and water-reservoirs of the Earth strongly suggests that there is a common origin for water in the Earth-Moon system."

Source: Moon Daily.
Link: http://www.moondaily.com/reports/Scientists_say_water_on_moon_may_have_originated_on_Earth_999.html.