Related papers: Activity in the lunar surface: Transient Lunar Phe…
We consider the implications from Paper I on how gas leaking through the lunar surface might interact with the regolith, and in what respects this might affect or cause the appearance of optical Transient Lunar Phenomena (TLPs). We consider…
In Papers II and III we show that Transient Lunar Phenomena (TLPs) are likely related to lunar outgassing, albeit in ways not fully understood. Here we propose a path forward, in which current and forthcoming technologies provide a more…
Herein the transient lunar phenomena (TLP) report database is subjected to a discriminating statistical filter robust against sites of spurious reports, and produces a restricted sample that may be largely reliable. This subset is highly…
We follow Paper I with predictions of how gas leaking through the lunar surface could influence the regolith, as might be observed via optical Transient Lunar Phenomena (TLPs) and related effects. We touch on several processes, but…
Transient lunar phenomena (TLPs) have been reported for centuries, but their nature is largely unsettled. A review of TLP reports shows regularities in the observations; a key question is whether this structure is imposed by human observer…
The intense activity of cratering on the Moon and in the inner regions of the solar system was accomplished during the first 10^9 years [1]. Occasionally, some impact events occur even nowadays. In Section 1, we treat, from a historical…
Time-limited space missions may miss rare occurrences of very dense clouds of lunar dust. At the same time, the information provided by the Earth-based monitoring of the Moon during at least the last three centuries still remains unused. In…
The lunar surface has been exposed to the space environment for billions of years and during this time has accumulated records of a wide range of astrophysical phenomena. These include solar wind particles and the cosmogenic products of…
Given the renewed scientific interest in lunar exploration missions, complete understanding of lunar near surface environment and its exosphere under different conditions is of paramount importance. Lunar exosphere has been extensively…
Ever since the Apollo era, a question has remained as to the origin of the lunar swirls (high albedo regions coincident with the regions of surface magnetization). Different processes have been proposed for their origin. In this work we…
11 transient bright flashes were detected in Jupiter's atmosphere using the UVS instrument on the Juno spacecraft. These bright flashes are only observed in a single spin of the spacecraft and their brightness decays exponentially with…
This paper shows how the exposure of the Moon to the Earth's plasmasheet is subject to decadal variations due to lunar precession. The latter is a key property of the Moon's apparent orbit around the Earth - the nodes of that orbit precess…
Context: Detecting moons around exoplanets is a major goal of current and future observatories. Moons are suspected to influence rocky exoplanet habitability, and gaseous exoplanets in stellar habitable zones could harbour abundant and…
The origin, distribution, depth and volume of lunar volatiles remain open questions. One of the possible sources of Moon's volatiles is their volcanic outgassing during the peak of lunar volcanic activity ~3.5 Ga. This same outgassing would…
If a transiting exoplanet has a moon, that moon could be detected directly from the transit it produces itself, or indirectly via the transit timing variations it produces in its parent planet. There is a range of parameter space where the…
Lunar occultation can be used to measure the proper motions of some of the long time scale microlensing events, $t_{e} \gsim 70$ days, now being detected toward the Galactic bulge. The long events are difficult to explain within the context…
Earthshine is the dominant source of natural illumination on the surface of the Moon during lunar night, and at locations within permanently shadowed regions that never receive direct sunlight. As such, earthshine may enable the exploration…
Numerous missions planned for the next decade are likely to target a handful of smal sites of interest on the Moon's surface, creating risks of crowding and interference at these locations. The Moon presents finite and scarce areas with…
Lunar dust -- the sub-millimeter fraction of the regolith -- controls the optical, thermophysical, electrical, mechanical, and environmental behavior of the Moon's surface. These properties set the performance envelopes of remote-sensing…
The increasing focus on lunar exploration requires innovative power solutions to support scientific research, mining, and habitation in the Moon's extreme environment. Optical power beaming (OPB) has emerged as a promising alternative to…