Heavily cratered surfaces on the Moon, Mars, and Mercury show that the terrestrial planets
were battered by an intense bombardment during their first billion years or more, but the …

The current state of understanding of the lunar interior is the sum of nearly four decades of
work and a range of exploration programs spanning that same time period. Missions of the …

Lunar mare basalts provide a probe to study the magmatic and thermal evolution of the
Moon. The Chang'e-5 (CE-5) mission returned samples from a young and hitherto …

The surface of the Moon is a critical boundary that shapes our understanding of the Moon as
a whole. All geologic mapping and remote sensing techniques utilize only the outermost …

Gamma ray spectroscopy data acquired by Lunar Prospector are used to determine global
maps of the elemental composition of the lunar surface. Maps of the abundance of major …

Abstract The Chang'E 5 (CE-5) samples represent the youngest mare basalt ever known
and provide an access into the late lunar evolution. Recent studies have revealed that CE-5 …

About 36 lunar meteorites have been found in cold and hot deserts since the first one was
found in 1979 in Antarctica. All are random samples ejected from unknown locations on the …

Geochemical evidence suggests that the material accreted by the Earth did not change in
nature during Earth's accretion, presumably because the inner protoplanetary disc had …

The onset of the 21st century is proving to be an exciting time for planetary exploration. A
high level of activity associated with the exploration of Mars and a resurgence of activity …

Abstract The 176 Lu–176 Hf radioactive decay system has been widely used to study
planetary crust–mantle differentiation. Of considerable utility in this regard is zircon, a …