Lunar swirls created by comets?, Whispy bright region on Earth's moon, remants of comet collisions. Options

[TheAnt]

This piece is not about any specific mission, even though the swirls have been imagined by orbiters.
I might be relevant since it could give an insight for some various features we discuss on this forum.
Crashing comets may explain mysterious lunar swirls

[marsbug]

Ah, i thought you were unconvinced that the swirls were a real phenomena, maybe in the same way that many see crepuscular rays as being some kind of optical illusion. Also I was shamelessly taking a chance to mention my blog, but i do also love a chance to point out how much interesting lunar science there still is to do.

Actually i do have a further thought: Many years ago i did my phd on plasma sputterinng, incluxing sputtering of powders. It should be fairly easy to set up powder targets of simulated lunar regolith, and a sputtering atmosphere of solar wind composition and the right energy. Not trivial, but completely do-able. Vararions in magnetic field can also be aarranged, and so we could try to gauge the possible effects of soar wind on regolith and see if it explains the swirls. I expect this has been done, but i don't recall reading any papers on it...

[TheAnt]

Oh I have no doubt that they're real features, but now that you mention it, it's true that light have to fall in the right angle to make them clearly visible. So the swirls are a bit elusive.

It was however dvandorn who expressed the strongest doubt, and I tend to agree insofar that a second look at the alternative explanations should be looked into. And I think you nailed it there marsbug, since the solar wind is the alternative I had in mind. It would also provide a mechanism to maintain the swirls even in one environment of constant micrometeorite bombardment.