apollo 16 regolith breccias characterization and evidence for early formation in the mega regolith all of the apollo 16 regolith breccias 8 specimens have been characterized in terms of their petrography grain size distribution porosity major and trace element composition noble gas contents and ferromagnetie resonance properties these breccias vary signkqcantly with respect to their density and porosity with the more dense breccias showing significant shock damage the regolith breccias resemble the soils in grain size distribution and in the relative proportions of major petrological components except agglutinates many of the breecias are compositionally different from the apollo 16 soils in that they lack an important marie component present in the soils although some groupings occur the petrologic and chemical compositions of the regolith breedas do not correlate with the station location of the samples all but one of the breceias show some evidence of irradiation at the lunar surface solar gases measurable fmr agglutinates and analyses made on grain size separates from two disaggregated breedas indicate that this irradiation occurred before compaction when the breccia material was finely disseminated on the surface however the concentrations of surface irradiation parameters solar gases fmr agglutinates for most breedas are far less than seen in any lunar soils or in regolith breccias from other apollo missions several breedas also contain unusually high trapped 4oar 36ar ratios of 8 12 and a significant fission xe component in excess of that expected from in situ production these observations suggest that the surface irradiation of these breedas occurred as early as 4 x 109 years ago we conclude that most of the apollo 16 regolith breedas were not formed from any known apollo 16 soil they appear to be well comminuted material that contains ancient regolith developed during the late stage heavy bombardment of the moon when large impacts were much more common relative to small impacts so that regoliths did not have time to significantly mature before being diluted by fresh ejecta and buffed this ancient megaregolith is significantly different from more recent lunar regolith but may be similar to asteroidal regoliths from which some brecciated meteorites have formed

geochemistry of grain size fractions of luna 24 soil comments on the lunar regolith chemistry and petrology of luna 24 grain size fractions by j c laul o d rode s b simon and j j papike

major lunar crustal terranes surface expressions and crust mantle origins in light of global remotely sensed data the igneous crust of the moon can no longer be viewed as a simple globally stratified cumulus structure composed of a flotation upper crust of anorthosite underlain by progressively more mafic rocks and a residual melt kreep sandwich horizon near the base of the lower crust instead global geochemical information derived from clementine multispectral data and lunar prospector gamma ray data reveals at least three distinct provinces whose geochemistry and petrologic history make them geologically unique 1 the procellarum kreep terrane pkt 2 the feldspathic high lands terrane fht and 3 the south pole aitken terrane spat the pkt is a mafic province coincident with the largely resurfaced area in the procellarum imbrium region whose petrogenesis relates to the early differentiation of the moon here some 40 of the th in the moon s crust is concentrated into a region that constitutes only about 10 of the crustal volume this concentration of th average 5 ppm and by implication the other heat producing elements u and k led to a fundamentally different thermal and igneous evolution within this region compared to other parts of the lunar crust lower crustal materials within the pkt likely interacted with underlying mantle materials to produce hybrid magmatism leading to the magnesian suite of lunar rocks and possibly kreep basalt although rare in the apollo sample collection widespread mare volcanic rocks having substantial th enrichment are indicated by the remote data and may reflect further interaction between enriched crustal residues and mantle sources the fht is characterized by a central anorthositic region that constitutes the remnant of an anorthositic craton resulting from early lunar differentiation basin impacts into this region do not excavate significantly more mafic material suggesting a thickness of tens of kilometers of anorthositic crust the feldspathic lunar meteorites may represent samples from the anorthositic central region of the fht ejecta from deep penetrating basin impacts outside of the central anorthositic region however indicate an increasingly mafic composition with depth the spat a mafic anomaly of great magnitude may include material of the upper mantle as well as lower crust thus it is designated a separate terrane whether the spa basin impact simply uncovered lower crust such as we infer for the fht remains to be determined

high resolution measurements of absolute thorium abundances on the lunar surface the lunar prospector lp gamma ray spectrometer grs has been used to map the global abundance of thorium on the lunar surface a global map of absolute thorium abundances on a 2 by 2 equal area pixel scale is presented using new detector modeling results and low altitude lp data because thorium is relatively abundant in kreep rich material these data provide fundamental information regarding the locations and importance of terranes that are rich in kreep bearing materials

the case for an imbrium origin of the apollo thorium rich impact melt breccias abstract mafic th rich impact melt breccias most of which are identified with the composition known as low k fra mauro lkfm are the most common rock type in the nonmare regoliths of the apollo lunar landing sites the origin of mafic impact melt breccias bears on many lunar problems the nature of the late meteoroid bombardment cataclysm the spatial distribution of kreep both near the surface and at depth the ages of the major basins and the composition of the early crust of the nearside lunar highlands thus it is crucial that the origin of mafic impact melt breccias be accurately understood because of both intra and intersite differences in compositions of mafic impact melt breccia samples apparent differences in crystallization age and differences in siderophile element ratios previous studies have argued that either 1 most mafic impact melt breccias are the products of several large craters local to the site at which they were found but that some are of basin origin or that 2 they are all from the imbrium apollos 14 and 15 nectaris apollo 16 and serenitatis apollo 17 basins here we reconsider the hypothesis that virtually all of the th rich mafic impact melt breccias from the apollo missions are products of the imbrium impact ejecta deposit modeling based on modern crater scaling indicates that the imbrium event produced ejecta deposits that average hundreds of meters thick or more at all apollo highland sites which is thicker than some previous estimates substantial amounts of imbrium ejecta should have been sampled at every apollo highland site we suggest that the mafic impact melt breccias may be the principal form of those ejecta the imbrium projectile impacted into th rich material that we regard as part of a unique mafic lunar geochemical province we call the high th oval region based on the surface distribution of th only basins within the high th oval region excavated th rich material the th concentrations of the highlands as observed by the apollo orbiting ray experiments are consistent with the estimates from ejecta modeling of the younger basin forming impacts only imbrium was large enough to produce the copious amount of melt required by the ubiquitous presence of mafic impact melt breccias in the apollo sampled regolith the high th oval region still may have been molten or hot at shallow depths 4 ga ago when the imbrium projectile struck we reason that compositional heterogeneity of ejected melt breccia is to be expected under these circumstances we argue that siderophile element fingerprints of mafic impact melt breccias are not inconsistent with production of all common types by a single projectile we suggest that the narrow range of ages of 3 7 4 0 ga for all successfully dated mafic impact melt breccias may reflect a single event whose age is difficult to measure precisely rather than a number of discrete impact events closely spaced in time such that reported age variations among mafic impact melt breccias reflect the ability to measure 40ar 39ar ages with greater precision than the accuracy with which measured portions of mafic impact melt breccias have recorded the time of their formation

lunar and martian meteorite delivery services launch mechanisms for lunar and martian meteorites have been investigated by integrating physical modeling constraints geochemical cosmic ray exposure cre constraints and petrologic constraints the potential source region for lunar meteorites is remarkably small compared to the final crater volume cre constraints indicate that most launches start at depths of 3 2 m and cratering theory implies derivation of suitably accelerated objects from a subvolume with diameter only about 0 3 the final crater diameter the shallow depth provenance is probably related to shock wave interference enhanced by the lunar regolith s extremely low compressional wave velocity cre constraints alone imply that four to five separate launch events are represented among the eight well studied lunar meteorites most of the lunar meteorites are regolith breccias which tend to show only limited compositional diversity within any kilometer scale region of the moon several others are polymict breccias which also show relatively subdued compositional diversity compared to igneous rocks the observed diversity among these samples in terms of abundances of mare basalt and kreep and in mg mg fe ratio implies that among eight well studied lunar meteorites only two potential source crater pairings are plausible between asuka 881757 y 793169 most probable and between y 793274 eet875721 altogether these eight lunar meteorites apparently represent at least six separate source craters including three in the past 105 years and five in the past 106 years cre constraints imply that snc meteorites are launched from systematically greater depths than lunar meteorites sncs are also systematically bigger and all nine well studied sncs are uncommonly young by martian standards mafic igneous rocks comparison between viking and apollo results reveals that rocks the size of common meteorites are remarkably scarce in the martian regolith probably due to pervasive weathering a plausible explanation for these trends is that most old small and shallow rocks on mars have been weakened by a two stage process of brecciation followed by pervasive weathering to the point where they seldom survive the stresses of spallation off the planet the scarcity of source crater pairing among the lunar meteorites implies that these objects can be launched from craters much smaller than previously estimated and tends to support the suggestion of rabinowitz 1993 astrophys j 407 412 427 that present day cratering rates for the earth moon region may be higher than previously estimated

some things we can infer about the moon from the composition of the apollo 16 regolith randy l korotev department of earth and planetary sciences and mcdonnell center for the space sciences washington university st louis missouri 63130 usa author s e mail address rlk levee wustl edu received 1996 september 16 accepted in revised form 1997 may 12 abstract characteristics of the regolith of cayley plains as sampled at the apollo 16 lunar landing site arereviewed and new compositional data are presented for samples of 1 mm fines soils and 1 2 mm rego lith particles as a means of determining which of the many primary igneous and secondary crystalline brec cias lithoiogic components that have been identified in the soil are volumetrically important and providing anestimate of their relative abundances more than 3 x 106 combinations of components representing nearly everylithology that has been observed in the apollo 16 regolith were systematically tested to determine which com binations best account for the composition of the soils conclusions drawn from the modeling include the fol lowing at the site mature soil from the cayley plains consists of 64 5 2 7 components representing prebasin materials anorthosites feldspathic breccias and a small amount 2 6 1 5 of total soil ofnonmare mafic plutonic rocks mostly gabbronorites on average these components are highly feldspathic with average concentrations of 31 32 a1203 and 2 3 feo and a molar mg mg fe ratio of 0 68 theremaining 36 of the regolith is syn and postbasin material 28 8 2 4 mafic impact melt breccias mimbs i e lkfm and vha basalts created at the time of basin formation 6 0 1 4 mare derived material impact and volcanic glass crystalline basalt with an average tio2 concentration of 2 4 and 1 postbasin meteoritic material the mimbs are the principal 80 90 carrier of incompatible traceelements rare earths th etc and the carrier of about one half of the siderophile elements and elementsassociated with mafic mineral phases fe mg mn cr sc most 71 of the fe in the present regolithderives from syn and postbasin sources mimbs mare derived material and meteorites thus althoughthe bulk composition of the apollo 16 regolith is nominally that of noritic anorthosite the noritic part themimbs and the anorthositic part the prebasin components are largely unrelated there is compositionalevidence that 3 4 of the soil is th rich material such as that occurring at the apollo 14 site and one frag ment of this type was found among the small regolith particles studied here if regolith such as that repre sented by the apollo 16 ancient regolith breccias was a protolith of the present regolith such regolith cannotexceed 71 of the present regolith the rest must be material added or redistributed since closure of theancient regolith breccias the postclosure material includes the mare derived material and the apollo 14 like component compositions of all mature surface soils from apollo 16 even those collected 4 km apart on the cayleyplains are very similar which is in stark contrast to the wide compositional range of the lithologies of whichthe soil is composed this uniformity indicates that the ratio of mimbs to feldspathic prebasin componentsis not highly variable in the megaregolith over distances of a few kilometers that there are no large sub surface concentrations of pure mafic impact melt breccia and that the intimate mixing is inherent to thecayley plains at a gross scale thus the mixing ofmafic impact melt breccias and feldspathic prebasin com ponents must have occurred during formation and deposition of the cayley plains such uniformity could nothave been achieved by small postdeposition impacts into a stratified megaregolith using this conclusion asone constraint and the known distribution of th on the lunar surface as another and the assumption that the im brium impact is primarily responsible for formation of the cayley plains arguments are presented that theapollo 16 mimbs derive from the imbrium region and consequently that one fourth of the apollo 16 regolithis primary imbrium ejecta in the form of mafic impact melt breccias

pristine lunar glasses criteria data and implications major element analyses of several thousand glasses from all of the apollo landing sites have resulted in the identification of 25 groups of pristine i e volcanic glass the nickel in these pristine glasses is shown to be indigenous not meteoritic contamination and to be correlated with mg the chemical data indicate that these glasses are consistently better candidates for primary magmas than the majority of crystalline mare basalts the pristine glasses support the view that assimilative processes ringwood and kesson 1976 involving two cumulate systems in the differentiated mantle operated during mare petrogenesis the reality of those assimilative interactions is evident by the occurrence of two linear arrays among the chemistries of the glasses data suggest that these cumulate components in the differentiated mantle persist for lateral distances of at least 1000 km and therefore appear to be products of a vast magma ocean that existed early in lunar history alternative hypotheses claiming that the highlands crust and mare source regions were produced by serial magmatism without a magma ocean have not yet considered all of the constraints derived from the pristine glasses

detection and interpretation of recent and historical streamflow alterations caused by river damming and hydropower production in the adige and inn river basins using continuous discrete and multiresolution wavelet analysis abstract in alpine catchments fluctuations of river discharge occur at multiple temporal scales due to natural e g snow and glacier melt and anthropogenic factors e g reservoir and hydropower operation in the last century several modifications of the natural flow regime have been observed originating in the complex interplay between construction of dams for hydropower production changes in water management policies and climate in this work we show that multiresolution analysis via discrete wavelet transform and continuous wavelet transform allow identifying both old breakpoints caused by dam and hydropower plant construction as well as more recent breakpoints caused by changes in hydropower plant operation according to the detected breakpoints we can differentiate a pre impact period natural flow regime post impact period characterized by river damming and hydropower facilities operation and a last period after the recent detected breakpoints caused by changes in water management moreover by analyzing streamflow time series and their log transform it is possible to highlight low flow alterations and distinguish the causes of the breakpoints since they affect different temporal scales the change point analysis is performed using different mother wavelets haar daubechies 2 db2 and daubechies 20 db20 considering the results obtained with the haar mother wavelet a total of 14 historical breakpoints in 13 streamflow time series belonging to the adige and inn catchments were identified and 93 correspond to metadata associated to river damming and hydropower production a total of 5 recent breakpoints were identified which correspond to metadata associated to river damming and hydropower production in case of the log transform of the streamflow 32 historical breakpoints were identified and 100 confirmed by metadata 20 recent breakpoints were detected and 83 correspond to metadata the uncertainty in the temporal location is investigated computing the mean difference between detected breakpoint temporal location and metadata and is generally smaller than 1 year this work shows that change point analysis performed using wavelet transform allows us to differentiate and correctly locate in time most of change points in streamflow variability that can be associated to river damming and hydropower production

ascent and eruption of a lunar high titanium magma as inferred from the petrology of the 74001 2 drill core abstract an analysis of the orange glasses and crystallized beads from the 68 cm deep 74001 2 core has been conducted to understand the processes occurring during ascent and eruption of the apollo 17 orange glass magma equilibrium between melt and metal blebs fe85ni14co1 within the core along with cr contents in olivine phenocrysts suggest there was an oxidation of c and a reduction of the melt at an o fugacity of iw 1 3 and 1320 c to form co gas at 200 bars or 4 km depth this was followed by development of more oxidized conditions during ascent also during ascent there was formation of euhedral homogeneous fo81 olivine crystals and spinel crystals with higher al and mg contents than the smaller spinels in the crystallized beads both the metal blebs and al rich spinels were trapped inside the fo81 olivine phenocrysts as they grew prior to eruption the composition of the orange glasses are homogeneous throughout the core except for a few distinct glasses at the top that appear to have been mixed in by micrometeorite reworking a few glassy melt inclusions of orange glass composition trapped in the fo81 phenocrysts contain 600 100 ppm s and 50 ppm cl compared to the 200 ppm s and 50 ppm cl in the orange glass melt when quenched these inclusions therefore document the addition of 400 ppm s to the co rich volcanic gas during the eruption the size and distribution of different volcanic beads in the apollo 17 deposit indicate a mode of eruption in which the orange glasses and partially crystallized beads formed further away from the volcanic vent where cooling rates were faster progressively larger and more numerous crystals in the black beads reflect slower cooling rates at higher optical densities in the volcanic plume the development of a brown texture in the orange glasses at the bottom of the core where the black beads dominate is interpreted to result from devitrification by subsolidus heating either as the orange glasses fell back through the hot plume or after deposition on the surface the change from domination by orange glasses to black beads in the core probably reflects a decrease in gas content over time which consequently would increase the plume optical density and favor slower cooling rates

the origin and evolution of lunar high ti basalts periodic melting of a single source at mare tranquillitatis abstract five groups of basalts a b1 b2 b3 d with three principal ages exist at the apollo 11 site these range from the low k low rare earth element ree groups b1 b2 and b3 to the low k high ree group d basalts to the high k high ree group a basalts the group a basalts are the only high k 0 2 wt k2o basalts and youngest with an age of 3 59 02 ga groups b3 and b1 are 3 71 02 and 3 67 02 ga respectively group b2 basalts are the oldest at 3 85 02 ga group d basalts have not been dated fractionation modelling for major and trace elements indicates that the b1 basalts could have formed from a b3 like parent liquid the b2 and d basalts can also be related to liquids similar to the b3 b1 composition through the presence of varying amounts of modal whitlockite thus the entirety of low k high ti basalts at apollo 11 may have formed through melting of the same source region the group a basalt compositions are consistent with formation from a different parent liquid with the composition of apollo 11 orange glass modelling of major and trace elements in the apollo 11 orange glass indicate that the composition of the group a basalts is consistent with fractionation of this glass coupled with some assimilation 7 5 15 of an evolved kreep like material however this component is much younger than primitive kreep 4 4 ga this neukreep component similar to the composition of quartz monzodiorites described from the apollo 15 site probably represents evolved material formed during plutonism prior to the formation of the apollo 11 orange glass liquid

a new look at the apollo 11 regolith and kreep although the apollo 11 mission landed in mare tranquillitatis 50 km from the nearest exposure of highlands small nonmare particles are conspicuous in the regolith the nonmare portion of the apollo 11 regolith is compositionally similar to the apollo 16 regolith at both sites most of the nonmare material is from the feldspathic highlands but some is mafic impact melt breccia with the chemical signature known as kreep for its high concentrations of k rare earth elements and p the composition of the apollo 11 regolith corresponds best to a mixture of 66 crystalline mare basalt 5 orange volcanic glass 20 material of the feldspathic highlands 8 kreep bearing impact melt breccia and 1 meteoritic material the volcanic glass and kreep bearing melt breccia components account for the high concentrations of mg and cr in the regolith the most kreep rich sample known from apollo 11 10085 1187 is an impact melt breccia that bears a strong textural and compositional similarity to a unique apollo 16 melt breccia 64815 although not of the maria such breccias are also not of the highlands provenance global data obtained from orbit show that kreep bearing materials are most common at low elevations in the imbrium procellarum region and are rare at high elevations thus as at apollo 16 the kreep bearing breccias of apollo 11 are probably ejecta from the imbrium impact into the low lying procellarum kreep terrane on the basis of these observation and others we suggest that the general acceptance of kreep as a material of the highlands is not supported by the data and results largely from historical accident

lithological variation with depth and decoupling of maturity parameters in apollo 16 regolith core 68001 2 using ferromagnetic resonance fmr and instrumental neutron activation analysis inaa we have determined the maturity surface exposure parameter zjfeo and concentrations of twenty five chemical elements on samples taken every half centimeter down the 61 cm length of the 68001 2 regolith core double drive tube collected at station 8 on the apollo 16 mission to the moon contrary to premission expectations no ejecta or other influence from south ray crater is evident in the core although a small inflection in the fe0 profile at 3 cm depth may be related the south ray crater impact regolith maturity generally decreases with depth as in several previously studied cores we recognize five compositionally distinct units in the core which we designate a through e although all are similar in composition to each other and to other soils from the cayley plains at the apollo 16 site unit a o 33 cm is mature to submature throughout zjfeo 89 34 units and is indistinguishable in composition from surface soils collected at station 8 unit b 33 37 cm is enriched slightly in a component of anorthositic norite composition unit d 42 53 cm is compositionally equivalent to 80 wt unit a soil plus 20 wt apollo 16 type dimict breccia consisting of subequal parts anorthosite and impact melt breccia compared to unit a unit e 53 61 cm contains a small proportion up to 4 of some component compositionally similar to apollo 14 sample 14321 unit c 37 42 cm is unusual for lithophile and siderophile elements it is similar to units a and d however fe0 is low throughout the unit 30 units and in a bluish gray zone at 41 cm depth zjfeo drops to 1 6 units the lowest value that we have observed in several hundred apollo 16 soil samples samples from the bluish gray zone also have low zn concentrations lo pg g compared to 20 30 pg g for the rest of the core although both values are consistent with fragmented rock material that has received virtually no surface exposure the abundance of agglutinates in the bluish gray soil of unit c is moderately high typical of a submature soil that would ordinarily have zjfeo 30 we believe that the anomalously low values of zjfeo and zn concentration result because the soil was heated to 8oo 1000 c probably during an impact this temperature range is sufficient to volatize the surface correlated zn and agglomerate the nanophase metal giving rise to the fmr signal but is not great enough to sinter the soil alternatively the unusual soil interval may represent a disaggregated or incipient regolith breccia although there is no significant difference in the texture or clast matrix relationships between unit c and adjacent units copyright 0 1997 elsevier science ltd

topography of the moon from the clementine lidar range measurements from the lidar instrument carried aboard the clementine spacecraft have been used to produce an accurate global topographic model of the moon this paper discusses the function of the lidar the acquisition processing and filtering of observations to produce a global topographic model and the determination of parameters that define the fundamental shape of the moon our topographic model a 72nd degree and order spherical harmonic expansion of lunar radii is designated goddard lunar topography model 2 gltm 2 this topographic field has an absolute vertical accuracy of approximately 100 m and a spatial resolution of 2 5 the field shows that the moon can be described as a sphere with maximum positive and negative deviations of 8 km both occurring on the farside in the areas of the korolev and south pole aitken s p aitken basins the amplitude spectrum of the topography shows more power at longer wavelengths as compared to previous models owing to more complete sampling of the surface particularly the farside a comparison of elevations derived from the clementine lidar to control point elevations from the apollo laser altimeters indicates that measured relative topographic heights generally agree to within 200 m over the maria while the major axis of the lunar gravity field is aligned in the earth moon direction the major axis of topography is displaced from this line by approximately 10 to the east and intersects the farside 24 north of the equator the magnitude of impact basin topography is greater than the lunar flattening 2 km and equatorial ellipticity 800 m which imposes a significant challenge to interpreting the lunar figure the floors of mare basins are shown to lie close to an equipotential surface while the floors of unflooded large basins except for s p aitken lie above this equipotential the radii of basin floors are thus consistent with a hydrostatic mechanism for the absence of significant farside maria except for s p aitken whose depth and lack of mare require significant internal compositional and or thermal heterogeneity a macroscale surface roughness map shows that roughness at length scales of 10 1 10 2 km correlates with elevation and surface age

mixing levels the apennine front soil component and compositional trends in the apollo 15 soils variations in concentrations of lithophile elements in samples of apollo 15 soil can be explained in terms of only four chemical components three components are represented by extrusive rock types found at the apollo 15 site mare basalt kreep basalt and the pyroclastic green glass associated with breccia 15426 the fourth component the highlands component can be represented by soil from the apennine front particularly the soil obtained from the 55 57 cm depth interval of station 2 core 15007 8 among samples of apennine front soil this one appears to be the least contaminated by mare materials and may be our most typical sample of the apennine front highlands although soil fron the apennine front is itself a complex mixture of many types of highlands rocks it behaves as a single component with respect to mixing with the other three rock type components the various subcomponents of the apennine front soil e g melt rock and anorthositic norite that have been used in some mixing models are not required as discrete components in order to explain the compositional variation among samples of apollo 15 soil most of this compositional variation results from mare highlands mixing i e apennine front soil with mare basalt kreep basalt which probably derives from local possibly unexposed sources is also a variable component of the soil and is most prevalent in the soil from stations lm 6 and 9

chemistry of the apollo 11 highland component chemical data 28 major minor and trace elements were obtained by instrumental neutron activation analysis inaa for 38 hand picked highland fragments 1 20 mg from coarse fines 10085 the apollo 11 highland chemical groups are represented by a range of petrographic types six major chemical highland groups are identified in the apollo 11 fragments these are 1 high k kreep 2 anorthosite e g 15415 60015 with 10 chondrite rare earth elements ree abundances a positive eu anomaly anorthosite with 30 chondrite abundances and a positive eu anomaly 3 anorthosite norite troctolite ant 67075 4 low k fra mauro lkfm 77135 5 anorthositic gabbro 68415 with no eu anomaly anorthositic gabbro 65055 67955 with a positive eu anomaly and anorthositic gabbro 68516 60015 with a negative eu anomaly and 6 apollo 11 dominant highland component 2 10 chondrite ree abundances with a positive 10 14 chondrite eu anomaly there are three newly recognized groups in the apollo 11 highland suite based on the ree patterns these are a ant with 5 chondrite la 22 chondrite abundances and a positive eu anomaly b 10 chondrite flat pattern with 14 chondrite positive eu anomaly and c 2 3 chondrite flat pattern with 10 chondrite positive eu anomaly the apollo 11 highland suite is very low in potassium non kreepy overall the apollo 11 highland suite is quite similar to the apollo 16 suite most previously recognized highland chemical groups are represented in the apollo 11 highland component

crater ejecta scaling laws fundamental forms based on dimensional analysis a model of crater ejecta is constructed using dimensional analysis and a recently developed theory of energy and momentum coupling in cratering events general relations are derived that provide a rationale for scaling laboratory measurements of ejecta to larger events specific expressions are presented for ejection velocities and ejecta blanket profiles in two limiting regimes of crater formation the so called gravity and strength regimes in the gravity regime ejecta velocities at geometrically similar launch points within craters vary as the square root of the product of crater radius and gravity this relation implies geometric similarity of ejecta blankets that is the thickness of an ejecta blanket as a function of distance from the crater center is the same for all sizes of craters if the thickness and range are expressed in terms of crater radii in the strength regime ejecta velocities are independent of crater size consequently ejecta blankets are not geometrically similar in this regime for points away from the crater rim the expressions for ejecta velocities and thickness take the form of power laws the exponents in these power laws are functions of an exponent that appears in crater radius scaling relations thus experimental studies of the dependence of crater radius on impact conditions determine scaling relations for ejecta predicted ejection velocities and ejecta blanket profiles based on measured values of are compared to existing measurements of velocities and debris profiles

compositional variation in apollo 16 impact melt breccias and inferences for the geology and bombardment history of the central highlands of the moon abstract high precision data for the concentrations of a number of lithophile and siderophile elements were obtained on multiple subsamples from 109 impact melt rocks and breccias mostly crystalline from the apollo 16 site compositions of nearly all apollo 16 melt rocks fall on one of two trends of increasing sm concentration with increasing sc concentration the eastern trend lower sm sc mg fe and sm yb ratios consists of compositional groups 3 and 4 of previous classification schemes these melt rocks are feldspathic poor in incompatible and siderophile elements and appear to have provenance in the descartes formation to the east of the site the western trend higher sm sc mg fe and sm yb ratios consists of compositional groups 1 and 2 these relatively mafic kreep bearing breccias are a major component 35 of the cayley plains west of the site and are unusual compared to otherwise similar melt breccias from other sites in having high concentrations of fe ni metal 1 2 the metal is the carrier of the low ir au 0 3 chondritic siderophile element signature that is characteristic of the apollo 16 site four compositionally distinct groups 1m 1f 2db and 2nr of western trend melt breccias occur that are each represented by at least six samples compositional group 1 of previous classification schemes the poikilitic or lkfm melt breccias can be subdivided into two groups group 1m represented by six samples including 60315 is characterized by lower al2o3 concentrations higher mgo and alkali concentrations and higher mg fe and cr sc ratios than group 1f represented by fifteen samples including 65015 group 1m also has siderophile element concentrations averaging about twice those of group 1f and ir au and ir ni ratios that are even lower than those of other western trend melt rocks ir au 0 24 0 03 ci normalized at the mafic extreme of group 2 vha melt breccias the melt lithology occurring as clasts in feldspathic fragmental breccias from north ray crater group 2nr is compositionally distinct from the melt lithology of dimict breccias from the cayley plains group 2db in having higher concentrations of sc cr and heavy rare earth elements and lower concentrations of siderophile elements the distinct siderophile element signature high absolute abundances low ir au ratio suggest that the four groups of mafic melt breccia are all somehow related ratios of some lithophile elements also suggest that they are more closely related to each other than they are to melt breccias from other apollo sites however none of the breccia compositions can be related to any of the others by any simple process of igneous fractionation or mixing involving common lunar materials thus the origin of the four groups of mafic melt breccia is enigmatic if they were produced in only one or two impacts then a mechanism exists for generating regimes of impact melt breccia in a single impact that are substantially different from each other in composition for various reasons including the problem of delivering large volumes of four different types of melt to the apollo 16 site it is unlikely that any of these breccias were produced in basin forming impacts if they were produced in as many as four crater forming impacts then the unusual siderophile element signature is difficult to explain possible explanations are 1 1 the four groups of melt breccia all contain metal from a single earlier impact 2 2 they were each formed by related metal rich meteoroids or 3 3 some common postimpact process has resulted in metal of similar composition in each of four melt pools within a compositional group most intrasample and intersample variation in lithophile element concentrations is caused by differences among samples in the proportion of a component of normative anorthosite or noritic anorthosite in most cases this compositional variation probably reflects variation in clast abundance for group 2db and probably 2nr differences in abundance of a component of ferroan anorthosite estimated al2o3 32 accounts for the compositional variation for groups 1m and 1f the anorthositic component is more mafic estimated al2o3 26 some group 2 samples may be related by a troctolitic component of varying abundance

abundance and distribution of iron on the moon the abundance and distribution of iron on the moon is derived from a near global data set from clementine the determined iron content of the lunar highlands crust 3 percent iron by weight supports the hypothesis that much of the lunar crust was derived from a magma ocean the iron content of lower crustal material exposed by the south pole aitken impact basin on the lunar farside is higher 7 to 8 percent by weight and consistent with a basaltic composition this composition supports earlier evidence that the lunar crust becomes more mafic with depth the data also suggest that the bulk composition of the moon differs from that of the earth9s mantle this difference excludes models for lunar origin that require the earth and moon to have the same compositions such as fission and coaccretion and favors giant impact and capture

petrology of the apollo 11 highland component new data for 38 highland fragments hand picked from apollo 11 coarse fines are reported petrographic mineralogic and bulk chemical data show that 1 the apollo 11 highland component is non kreepy and like that of apollo 16 2 poikilitic rocks granulitic breccias and the anorthosite norite troctolite suite are the most abundant rock types followed by polymict breccias and glasses 3 both the ferroan anorthosite and mg rich plutonic suites are represented in the apollo 11 highland component 4 except for one sample the intermediate k fra mauro and high k fra mauro groups are not represented the data and observations are consistent with local derivation of the highland material from beneath relatively thin basalt flows and addition to the regolith via vertical mixing

the great lunar hot spot and the composition and origin of the apollo mafic lkfm impact melt breccias thorium rich mafic impact melt breccias from the apollo 14 17 missions that is those breccias identified with the composition known as lkfm are regarded largely as products of basin forming impacts that penetrated the feldspathic crust and sampled underlying mafic material and magma ocean residuum carrying the compositional signature of kreep potassium rare earth elements phosphorous despite considerable compositional variation among such breccias compositions of all of them correspond to mixtures of only four components 1 a norite with composition generally similar to that of apollo 15 basalt mean abundance 58 range 30 95 2 fo 90 dunite mean 13 range 1 27 3 feldspathic upper crust mean 29 range 4 50 and feni metal 0 1 1 7 petrographic evidence has shown that much of the feldspathic component but none of the kreep component is clastic this observation and the high proportion of kreep norite component in the breccias suggest that the melt zone of the impact or impacts forming the breccias contained little feldspathic material but consisted predominantly of material with the average composition of kreep norite the dunite component probably derives ultimately from the upper mantle these conclusions support the hypothesis that the breccias were not formed in typical feldspathic crust but instead by one or more impacts into what is designated here the great lunar hot spot that is the anomalous th rich terrane in the imbrium procellarum area identified by the apollo and lunar prospector gamma ray spectrometers the lkfm composition is a special product of the great lunar hot spot and is not the average composition of the lower crust in typical feldspathic highlands similarly mg suite and alkali suite plutonic rocks of the apollo collection are likely all differentiation products of the hot spot not of plutons that might occur in typical feldspathic crust

basaltic magmatism on the moon a perspective from volcanic picritic glass beads abstract it is widely accepted that basaltic magmas are products of partial fusion of periodotite within planetary mantles as such they provide valuable insights into the composition structure and processes of planetary interiors those compositions which approach primary melt compositions provide the most direct information about planetary interiors and serve as a starting point to understand basaltic evolution within the collection of lunar samples returned by the apollo and luna missions are homogeneous picritic glass beads of volcanic origin these picritic glasses are our closest approximations to primary magmas as such these glass beads provide a unique perspective concerning the origin of mare basalts the characteristics of the lunar interior and processes in the early differentiation of the moon we have obtained trace element data for these picritic glasses using sims techniques these data and literature isotopic and experimental data on the picritic glasses are placed within the framework of mare basaltic magmatism the volcanic glasses are very diverse in their trace element characteristics for example they have a wide range of ree pattern shapes and concentrations like the crystalline mare basalts all picritic glasses have a negative eu anomaly unlike the crystalline mare basalts there is little correlation between the size of the eu anomaly and overall ree concentrations trace element differences among the various glasses suggests that a kreep component was incorporated into their mantle source this implies large scale mixing of the lunar magma ocean derived cumulate pile subtle differences among glasses suggest that local mixing of sources may also have been an important process preservation of subtle chemical differences in the picritic glasses and crystalline basalts may be interpreted as indicating that they were produced by small to moderate degrees of partial melting and that the lunar mantle did not experience extensive melting during episodes of mare volcanism several lines of evidence are consistent with the view that the picritic glasses were derived from mantle sources that were compositionally distinct from the sources for crystalline mare basalts these are parallel but no common liquid lines of descent chemical differences between picritic glasses and the more primitive crystalline mare basalts experimental studies indicating that the picritic glasses are multiply saturated at depths greater than that of the mare basalts differences in lead isotopic data and the mode of eruption i e fire fountaining for glass beads these data also provide circumstantial evidence that suggests that the picritic glasses were derived from a source somewhat more volatile rich than that of the mare basalts several petrogenetic models are suggested by the trace element characteristics of the picritic glasses 1 1 partial melting of heterogeneous lunar mantle at depths greater than 300 km to produce the parental magmas picritic for both the mare basalts and picritic glasses picritic magmas represented by glass beads were erupted to the surface with small degrees of fractional crystallization while mare basalts were produced by larger degrees of fractional crystallization 15 30 of similar but not identical picritic magmas 2 2 picritic magmas represented by the glass beads were generated at depths greater than 400 km in a volatile enriched relative to the mare basalt source heterogeneous mantle while mare basalts are fractional crystallization products of picritic magmas generated at depths of less than 400 km 3 3 the picritic magmas represented by the glass beads represent polybaric melting that initiated at depths of at least 1000 km a primitive mantle component or less processed cumulate mantle components may have been involved in the generation of the picritic glasses in any of these models

apollo 16 site geology and impact melts implications for the geologic history of the lunar highlands the geology of the apollo 16 site is reconsidered on the basis of data from photogeology geochemical remote sensing and lunar samples the site possesses an upper surface of anorthositic gabbro and related rocks mafic components were deposited as basin ejecta the events involved in its geological evolution were the nectaris impact and the imbrium impact the role of large local craters in the history of the region was to serve as topographic depressions to accumulate basin ejecta the most abundant melt composition at apollo 16 is an aluminous variety of lkfm basalt supplied by the nectaris impact as ejected basin impact melt the mafic lkfm melt may have been supplied by the imbrium impact more aluminous melt groups are probably derived from local small craters the remainder of the deposits in the region are composed of anorthositic clastic debris derived from the nectaris basin the local crustal substrate and imbrium and other basins

mare tranquillitatis basalt emplacement history and relation to lunar samples galileo and clementine multispectral data of the mare tranquillitatis region have been analyzed to investigate the stratigraphy of basaltic units and the effects of lateral and vertical mixing processes within the mare the distribution of compositionally distinct mare units is observed to be correlated with previous uv vis ratio images although estimates of soil titanium contents are low in some areas as a result of mixing of local basalts with nonmare feldspathic materials basalt units identified by their spectral properties and spectral mixture analysis are compared with groups of apollo 11 samples defined by previous workers on the basis of age and chemistry spectral studies presented here indicate that the apollo 11 site lies at the edge of a localized western mare unit which includes the youngest and most titanium rich basalts in tranquillitatis apollo 11 high k high ti samples in southern tranquillitatis these basalts have been contaminated by a large degree of mixing with nonmare feldspathic materials nonmare materials near the apollo 11 site are attributed largely to crater rays from theophilus 100 km in diameter which is located approximately 300 km to the south a more extensive and stratigraphically older unit exposed near apollo 11 is related to the low k high ti apollo 11 samples and appears to extend as a coherent surface unit as far north as the apollo 17 site in southern serenitatis the distribution of this spectrally identified basalt unit supports petrologic and geochemical evidence for the grouping of the high ti low k apollo 11 and 17 basalt samples into the same regional volcanic events multispectral analysis of tranquillitatis deposits also identify low titanium basalts in the northeastern and southeastern portions of the basin that are older than the high ti basalts and are believed to be unsampled by apollo 11 several lines of evidence suggest that the cayley formation along the western tranquillitatis margin may indeed lie on top of an ancient mare deposit buried by imbrium basin ejecta e g a cryptomare deposit the distribution of vertically excavated feldspathic premare material within the mare provides information on the depth of the mare units and the proximity of the underlying basin topography compositional stratigraphy observed in both sets of multispectral data supports an asymmetric premare fill basin topography containing thicker basalts in the northwestern portion of the basin than previously predicted by crater flooding data

the imbrium impact event and the thorium distribution at the lunar highlands surface late in the moon s heavy bombardment period the impact that formed the imbrium basin excavated and melted a tremendous volume of material that was subsequently distributed over most of the moon s surface the apollo orbiting ray experiments metzger et al 1977 show that the imbrium projectile struck in a th rich area called the high th oval region here and regarded as a unique lunar geochemical province imbrium primary ejecta were thus probably rich in th it is shown here using ejecta deposit modeling that the distribution of th in the highlands surface along the ground tracks of the ray spectrometers is consistent with the distribution expected for imbrium ejecta deposits deep basins other than imbrium appear to have excavated regions of lower crust that were mafic and fe bearing but not th rich the possibility that the surface th distribution arises mainly from imbrium ejecta has implications for the nature of the moon s igneous differentiation and the nature of the proposed cataclysm or late bombardment with large meteoroids

localization of self potential sources in volcano electric effect with complex continuous wavelet transform and electrical tomography methods for an active volcano 1 this study concerns the fluid flow circulation associated with magmatic intrusion during volcanic eruptions from electrical tomography studies the objective is to localize and characterize the sources responsible for electrical disturbances during a time evolution survey between 1993 and 1999 of an active volcano the piton de la fournaise we have applied a dipolar probability tomography and a multi scale analysis on synthetic and experimental sp data we show the advantage of the complex continuous wavelet transform which allows to obtain directional information from the phase without a priori information on sources in both cases we point out a translation of potential sources through the upper depths during periods preceding a volcanic eruption around specific faults or structural features the set of parameters obtained vertical and horizontal localization multipolar degree and inclination could be taken into account as criteria to define volcanic precursors

lunar iron and titanium abundance algorithms based on final processing of clementine ultraviolet visible images the clementine mission to the moon returned global imaging data collected by the ultraviolet visible uvvis camera this data set is now in a final state of calibration and a five band multispectral digital image model dim of the lunar surface will soon be available to the science community we have used observations of the lunar sample return sites and stations extracted from the final dim in conjunction with compositional information for returned lunar soils to revise our previously published algorithms for the spectral determination of the feo and tio2 content of the lunar surface the algorithms successfully normalize the effects of space weathering so that composition may be determined without regard to a surface s state of maturity these algorithms permit anyone with access to the standard archived dim to construct high spatial resolution maps of feo and tio2 abundance such maps will be of great utility in a variety of lunar geologic studies

nonlinear spectral mixture modeling of lunar multispectral data implications for lateral transport linear and nonlinear spectral mixture models applied to clementine multispectral images of the moon result in roughly similar spatial distributions of end member abundances however there are important differences in the absolute values of the predicted abundances the magnitude of these differences and the implications for understanding geological processes are investigated across a geologic contact between mare and highland in the grimaldi basin on the western nearside of the moon vertical and lateral mass transport due to impact cratering has redistributed mare and highland materials across the contract creating a gradient in composition solutions to linear and nonlinear spectral mixture models for identical spectral end members of mature mare mature highland and fresh crater materials are compared across this simple geologic contact in the grimaldi basin formal estimates of uncertainty in the calculated fractions of the end members are 1 profiles of mare abundance across the contact are extracted and compared quantitatively profiles from the linear mixture models indicate that the geologic contact has an average mare abundance of 60 and the compositional boundary is asymmetric with more mare transported onto the highland side of the contact than highland onto the mare side of the contact in contrast the nonlinear abundance profiles indicate that the geologic contact has an average mare abundance of 50 and the compositional boundary is remarkably symmetric given the expectation that materials will be intimately mixed on the surface of the moon and that the asymmetries implied by the linear model are not consistent with our understanding of lunar surface processes the non linear spectral mixture model is preferred and should be applied whenever quantitative abundance information is required the remarkable symmetry in the compositional gradients across this contact indicates that lateral mass transport dominates over vertical transport at this boundary

the materials of the lunar procellarum kreep terrane a synthesis of data from geomorphological mapping remote sensing and sample analyses major features of the moon s procellarum kreep terrane include subdued relief and extensive resurfacing with mare basalt consistent with high concentrations of th and other heat producing elements at depth we relate the chemistry of sampled materials to the geomorphology th surface concentrations determined by the lunar prospector 2 pixels and feo and tio2 concentrations derived from clementine ultraviolet visible spectral data on the basis of geologic maps each pixel was classified as mare terra or mixed near the periphery of the terrane terra pixel compositions are relatively feldspathic in the interior they mainly represent imbrium basin rim or ejecta deposits and are mainly incompatible trace element rich norites and presumably represent materials from a thick section tens of kilometers of the pre imbrium crust of the terrane excavated by the imbrium event although imbrium ejecta are the principal source of surface terra materials the imbrium event did not create the th rich procellarum kreep terrane broad continuous expanses of mare pixels are observed with little interruption from protruding terra or terra penetrating craters the mare basalt dominated regoliths of these areas have a wide range of tio2 concentrations 18 leading to the conclusion that the high th concentrations are in the mare basalts and are not present in the regoliths as terra derived materials volcanic glasses and impact glasses of mare basalt composition collected from the procellarum kreep terrane support this conclusion

lunar coordinates in the regions of the apollo landers laser retroreflectors were placed on the moon by apollo 11 apollo 14 apollo 15 and lunakhod 2 since then lunar laser ranging retroreflector measurements of the true distances between retroreflectors and earth based laser telescopes have been made by recording transit times the accuracy of these measurements has evolved from 10 cm in the 1970s to 3 cm in the 1990s accurate lunar coordinates of the retroreflectors were determined from these measurements williams et al 1996 apollo lunar surface experiment packages alsep were delivered to the lunar surface on missions 12 14 15 16 and 17 coordinates of these stations were determined from very long baseline interferometry vlbi measurements of their transmissions the vlbi measurements were combined with the laser ranging coordinates available at that time king et al 1976 these solutions for the alsep locations have been modified to be compatible with the current retroreflector solutions coordinates of lunar module locations and nearby craters are given

a chemical and petrological model of the lunar crust and implications for lunar crustal origin we utilize a variety of lunar sample and orbital geochemical data in conjunction with current knowledge of impact cratering processes to develop a chemical and petrological model of the lunar crust orbital chemical data indicate that the upper highlands surface on the moon has the bulk composition of anorthositic gabbro al2o3 26 28 wt greater than 90 of the area covered is dominated by material having compositional affinities with the ferroan anorthosites rather than with apollo type mg suite rocks considerations of the cumulative bombardment history of the moon indicate that the outer zone of impact brecciation extends tens of kilometers into the crust given the resolution of the orbital gamma ray data the ferroan anorthositic composition derived for the highlands surface may represent the bulk composition of the upper half of the lunar crust the observed enrichment in noritic components in basin ejecta with increasing basin size together with considerations of impact melt petrogenesis in lunar basins suggest that the bulk composition of the lower lunar crust is noritic al2o3 20 wt samples of lower crustal material are probably present in the apollo collections in the form of low k fra mauro lkfm and very high alumina vha basaltic impact melts our estimated value of total crustal al2o3 content 24 25 wt suggests that the lunar crust contains too much aluminum to have originated by a purely serial magmatism mechanism the large abundance of plagioclase within the lunar crust is probably a result of global scale fractionation of plagioclase in early lunar history the magma ocean hypothesis of crustal origin more readily explains the bulk composition of the lunar crust