NASA brought back a total of 382 kilograms of lunar soil during the Apollo mission, so why study the 1What about 731 kilograms of lunar soil?
In fact, many Americans reacted even more than we did.
The main reason is that the U.S. Apollo mission and Chang'e's moon landing site are different. The difference between the two places is like sampling in the flower bed of your community, and the other going to Changbai Mountain to sample, the difference must be very big.
The samples retrieved by Chang'e-5 were only about 2 billion years old, at least 800 million years younger than the samples from the Apollo mission, and China had a principle when formulating the lunar landing site: to stay away from the landing sites of the United States and the Soviet Union to avoid duplicating information.
The understanding of the moon is still very limited in the six lunar landing samples of the United States, and the area that China's Chang'e-5 traveled to half a century later is completely different from the area where the United States landed six times and several landing sites in the former Soviet Union.
Since the age of the lunar soil samples brought back by the United States is basically more than 3 billion years, the information about the water content in them is more susceptible to the interference of the extraneous meteorites in the hundreds of millions of years, which makes it possible for us to misjudge the water content inside the moon for a long time, while the lunar soil we brought back is younger, and it is relatively more accurate to judge the water content inside the moon. At present, the composition of the basalt brought back by Chang'e-5 shows that the water content of the lunar mantle source area there is very low.
Moreover, our samples show that the magma source region has a very low U Pb ratio and a low proportion of radioactive thermogenic elements, which completely breaks our previous understanding of the evolution of the Moon and the mechanism of magmatic genesis, and that the geological life of the Moon is longer than we expected, and is not caused by the accumulation of heat from radioactive thermogenic elements.
Therefore, the place where Chang'e-5 landed is very different from the previous Apollo, with unusually active volcanic activity, which has ruled out the influence of radioactive thermogenic elements and water, so what is the reason behind it?I don't know yet.
This is of key significance for the specific establishment of subsequent lunar missions, and when setting new goals, we should avoid the wrong direction of research and return in vain. Whether it is China or the United States, it can save a lot of money.
China has been actively promoting international cooperation in the study of lunar samples, so this time the olive branch thrown by the United States, China will provide nine out of nine. This time, China's seventh round of application window will close on December 22, so the results will not be known until the end of the month.
But I believe that China will definitely say that it hopes that the United States can repeal the relevant restriction bills, no longer restrict Sino-US cooperation, China's lunar samples, and the Chinese themselves have the final say.
According to the rhetoric of the United States, the Wolf Amendment does not "completely prohibit" cooperation, and NASA can apply "cheekily" as long as it is approved by Congress and some conditions are met, so as long as it wants to do it, there is still an opening to open. It's just that I never thought that in order to obtain China's Chang'e-5 lunar samples, the U.S. Congress could give NASA legal privileges.
Science knows no borders, and the United States is the one who sets the limits.
I disagree with many people in that I think that this sample if it is provided, this is another "science diplomacy" after "ping pong diplomacy", and the occurrence of this rare thing means that the US-China relationship has eased, but it is still far from a thaw, but this time the United States has made a gesture is still a good start. NASA applied for a study of lunar soil samples from China