Health & Science

The moon: Wetter than anyone thought

Scientists were ecstatic last year when data from a lunar orbiter found evidence of water—thick deposits of water-bearing ice—on the moon. Now, says Scientific American, it turns out that there’s far more water on the Earth’s cold orbital companion than scientists ever suspected. The spacecraft data prompted researchers to reanalyze rocks taken from the moon four decades ago. Studies at the time found no trace of water in the samples, but modern techniques are far more refined, and the new study detected traces of hydroxyl, a molecule that’s left behind when molten, water-bearing rock cools. The amounts were minuscule, between 64 and 5,000 parts per billion, but it adds up to at least 100 times more water than was previously thought. All told, the moon’s water—locked away in rocks under the surface—equals “about two and a half times the volume of the Great Lakes,” says lead author Francis McCubbin; that’s roughly enough to cover the moon in a 3-foot-deep sea. Some water may have arrived with icy comets, but most was likely held in the ocean of magma that covered the moon when it was new. Some of that original water boiled off or evaporated, but some got locked in as the magma cooled into rock. “I like to use the analogy of someone who’s trying to make nonalcoholic beer,” McCubbin says. “There’s always going to be some alcohol left.” The discovery is sure to fuel new schemes for establishing a self-sustaining manned base on the moon, with a water supply extracted from rocks.

To an asteroid and back

Subscribe to The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Sign up

After a fiery descent through Earth’s atmosphere, a capsule from the Japanese space probe Hayabusa landed in the Australian Outback last week, bearing what scientists hope are the first geological samples ever retrieved from an asteroid. In 2005, Hayabusa landed on a rubbly asteroid named Itokawa. The craft was designed to suck up soil samples after firing a bullet into the hard surface, but scientists aren’t certain that the process went as planned. “It may have worked, it may not; we just don’t know,” Michael Zolensky of NASA’s Johnson Space Center tells BBCnews.com. The returned capsule has been shipped to researchers in Tokyo, and it will take several weeks for the samples, if any exist, to be analyzed. Asteroids are geological fossils; their rocks have never been weathered or recycled by tectonic activity, so they offer an unprecedented window onto the origin and evolution of the solar system. Sending a spacecraft to intercept a speeding asteroid, land on it, and bring back samples is a stunning achievement, says Peter Jenniskens of the SETI Institute in California. “The fact that they’ve been able to bring it back to Earth is incredible.”

Why Jonni can’t spell

Parents now spend many hours, and even hire consultants, trying to pick the right name for their baby. That investment may be worthwhile, as scientists say that a person’s name can affect their life well into adulthood. Kids with unusual variations on a common name are slower to spell and read, which “suggests a lot about internalizing,” Northwestern researcher David Figlio tells LiveScience.com. “You have the child named Jennifer spelled with a ‘G’—her teacher says, ‘Are you sure your name is spelled that way?’ That can be incredibly hard on a person’s confidence.” In another study, Figlio found that girls with more feminine names were more likely to take advanced classes in humanities, while those with male names like Morgan tended toward math and science. Meanwhile, boys with “girl” names like Shannon and Ashley were more likely to develop disciplinary problems, probably because of anger resulting from teasing and self-consciousness. Perhaps most troubling is that kids with odd names that sound “ghetto” or “poor” do worse in school, are less likely to be recommended for gifted classes, and are more likely to be pegged as learning disabled—even if they come from middle-class homes. “Those kids ended up being treated differently,” Figlio says. It may be unfair, he says, but names create expectations that powerfully influence a child’s development, so be careful what you choose.

When north is up

North is not “up” and south is not “down” … right? Try convincing the average traveler. In a recent experiment, volunteers were shown maps and asked to choose the shortest route among several that were actually of identical length. The subjects showed an unconscious preference for southerly routes—in part, researchers believe, because they perceived them as going “downhill” and therefore easier. On average, the subjects estimated that an 800-mile drive would go faster—about 100 minutes quicker—if driven north to south rather than vice versa. When asked to explain, the subjects said they expected northern routes to be more scenic and demand more energy than southern routes—indicating a belief that northern routes required climbing into higher elevations. So beware the assumption that “north is up,” Tufts University researcher Tad Brunyé tells Science News—it will lead to mistakes in picking routes and estimating travel time.