Possible recent lunar volcanism Options

[Bjorn Jonsson]

This is very interesting - and unexpected (at least to me):

http://lroc.sese.asu.edu/posts/818

Apparently there may be small features of volcanic origin on the Moon that are less than 100 million years old. The images are also very interesting - I would probably never have guessed that the image at the top was of lunar terrain.

[GoneToPlaid]

Hi everyone,

The colors shown by Neil Spence are mostly true, although overly enhanced in terms of saturation and contrast. The upshot is that the floor of the Ina caldera does have a distinctly blue color. Ina's blue hue is confirmed by the LRO's WAC camera, and is confirmed by even the most basic color balancing techniques which one would use for the Apollo 17 Hasselblad photographs of Ina. Amazingly, a couple of the best ground based photographs of the moon taken by amateur astronomers show Ina as only a few pixels in size, yet with a distinctly blue color.

The floor of the Ina caldera is comprised of approximately 10% titanium dioxide in the form of ilmenite. This explains the blue hue for Ina's lower units since TiO2 is a very blue mineral. The eastern areas of the floor exhibit very little heiligenschein in comparison to the mounds and to the surrounding terrain. This alone suggests that parts of the floor in the caldera are very young.

TiO2 map of Ina and the surrounding region:


Photograph AS17-152-23287:


Photograph AS17-152-23287 aligned and overlaid on top of LRO image M119815703LCRC. This is what Ina really looks like:


Photograph AS17-153-23577:


Photograph AS17-153-23578:


The large central mound is Agnes. Agnes is located on the eastern portion of the Ina caldera. Note the cratering on Agnes. Now note the general lack of any significant cratering on the foamy lava floor which surrounds Agnes. In fact, nearly all of the extremely tiny craters seen on the foamy lava floor actually contain a tiny boulder.


I hope that you enjoyed viewing these photos.

Best regards,

--GTP