Chandrayaan-3 landed on possibly oldest craters of Moon, say researchers

Chandrayaan-3 lands in ancient Moon crater, revealing lunar evolution and impact basin formation.

India's lunar mission Chandrayaan-3 possibly landed in one of the oldest craters of the Moon, according to scientists who analysed images from the mission and satellites.

The crater was formed during the Nectarian period, which dates back to 3.85 billion years and is one of the oldest time periods in the Moon's history, the team, including researchers from the Physical Research Laboratory and Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO), Ahmedabad said.

S Vijayan, an associate professor in the Planetary Sciences Division, Physical Research Laboratory, told PTI, "Chandrayaan-3 landing site is a unique geological setting where no other missions have gone. The images from the mission's Pragyan rover are the first on-site ones of the Moon at this latitude. They reveal how the Moon evolved over time".

A crater is formed when an asteroid crashes into the surface of a larger body like a planet or a Moon, and the displaced material is called 'ejecta'.

Revealing how the Moon evolved over time, the images showed that one-half of the crater was buried under material thrown out or 'ejecta' from the South Pole-Aitken basin — the largest and most known impact basin on the Moon, the researchers said.

An impact basin is a large, complex crater with diameter over 300 km, while a crater measures under 300 km in diameter.

Forming of ejecta is "similar to when you throw a ball on sand and some of it gets displaced or thrown outwards into a small pile," explained Vijayan, who is the corresponding author on the study that appeared in the journal Icarus.