10 April 2010
Research into lunar meteorites by a team of Chinese scientists has provided new evidence to support the giant-impact theory, which argues that the Moon was formed after a Mars-sized body impacted the Earth 4.5 billion years ago. Scientists with the Purple Mountain Observatory conducted research on three lunar meteorites from the U.S. space agency NASA and found chlorine isotopic fractionation, which only occurs in ultra-high-temperature and ultra-high-energy conditions, such as a giant collision between astronomical bodies.
MORE...