Sunday, 3 April 2016

Any new info about solar flares hitting the Moon added by the LADEE mission?

This article from 2011 mentions simulations about the sputtering effect caused by a solar flare hitting the Moon:




"We found that when this massive cloud of plasma strikes the moon, it
acts like a sandblaster and easily removes volatile material from the
surface," said William Farrell, DREAM team lead at NASA Goddard. "The
model predicts 100 to 200 tons of lunar material – the equivalent of
10 dump truck loads – could be stripped off the lunar surface during
the typical 2-day passage of a CME."




The researchers said they were waiting for LADEE to confirm these simulations and add new data, but I didn't find any conclusions on this subject on the mission website. I was interested if this event can create a significant static electricity difference between the 2 sides of the Moon, causing some sort of lightnings on the edges or even a mini-version of a dust storm.

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