Water on the Moon Options

[Juramike]

Recent space.com article describes H2O detected in Apollo samples of volcanic glass beads:
http://www.space.com/scienceastronomy/080709-moon-water.html

The authors estimate this implies a concentration of 260 ppm H2O in the lunar magma. [The article states this is close to the level of H2O in some Earth magma environments]

-Mike

[marsbug]

The ice thought to be in the shadowed polar craters is usually attributed to cometary impacts or the solar wind combining with oxygen in lunar rocks. The bbc article is talking about chemically bound hydrogen in magma that solidified billions of years ago. The hydrogen may be from ( and so indicitive of) water abundance in ancient lunar rocks, but may alsio be from other sources like the solar wind or other H bearing materials. Lastly, to quote that article:

They demonstrated that it was possible to start with any water composition in the magma and, by varying only the degree of crystallisation and the chlorine content, reproduce all the features seen in a diverse range of apatite from the Moon.

Bolding mine.

It sounds to me less like a confirmed number for ancient lunar water that is less than previously thought, and more like there is now reason to doubt any estimate of ancient lunar water based on apatite H content. Less than the terrestrial levels of hydration would fit better than terrestrial levels, but it doesn't sound like they have a really firm idea of how much.

Plus: The Moon is (apparently) 95 million years younger than the rest of the solar system, although some dating methods disagree.

So we may actually have more questions about the Moon than ever, which will please lunar geologists!