Related papers: Lunar impact craters identification and age estima…
The circumplanetary environments in our Solar System host a stunning array of moon and ring systems. Study of these environs has yielded valuable insights into planetary system formation and evolution, and there is every reason to believe…
The increasing number of transiting exoplanets sparked a significant interest in discovering their moons. Most of the methods in the literature utilize timing analysis of the raw light curves. Here we propose a new approach for the direct…
The lunar surface is a compelling location for large, distributed optical facilities, with significant advantages over orbital facilities for high spatial resolution astrophysics. The serious development of mission concepts is timely…
The lunar geological record is expected to contain a rich record of the galactic environment of the Solar System, including records of nearby (i.e. less than a few tens of parsecs) supernova explosions. This record will be composed of two…
We simulate the hypothesised collision between the proto-Earth and a Mars-sized impactor that created the Moon. Amongst the resulting debris disk in some impacts, we find a self-gravitating clump of material. It is roughly the mass of the…
The Artemis program requires robotic and crewed lunar rovers for resource prospecting and exploitation, construction and maintenance of facilities, and human exploration. These rovers must support navigation for 10s of kilometers (km) from…
Aims. An asymmetric dust cloud was detected around the Moon by the Lunar Dust Experiment on board the Lunar Atmosphere and Dust Environment Explorer mission. We investigate the dynamics of the grains that escape the Moon and their…
The erosion of lunar soil by rocket exhaust plumes is investigated experimentally. This has identified the diffusion-driven flow in the bulk of the sand as an important but previously unrecognized mechanism for erosion dynamics. It has also…
The Medusae Fossae Formation (MFF) is an enigmatic sedimentary unit near the equator of Mars, with an uncertain formation process and absolute age. Due to the heavily wind-eroded surface, it is difficult to determine the absolute model age…
The impact cratering record of the Moon and the terrestrial planets provides important clues about the formation and evolution of the Solar System. Especially intriguing is the epoch 3.8-3.9 Gyr ago (Ga), known as the Late Heavy Bombardment…
The trailing hemisphere of Dione is characterized by the Wispy Terrain, where it exhibits a hemispheric-scale network of extensional tectonic faults superposed on the moon's cratered surface. The faults likely reflect past endogenic…
As the only icy satellite with a thick atmosphere and liquids on its surface, Titan represents a unique end-member to study the impact cratering process. Unlike craters on other Saturnian satellites, Titan's craters are preferentially…
As an end-member of terrestrial planet formation, Mercury holds unique clues about the original distribution of elements in the earliest stages of solar system development and how planets and exoplanets form and evolve in close proximity to…
Due to its absence of an atmosphere and relative geological inertness, the Moon's surface records past impacts of objects from the Solar system and beyond. We examine the prospects for discovering extrasolar material near the lunar surface…
Systematic geomorphological mapping and detailed landform analysis using the highest resolution images obtained by the New Horizons spacecraft reveal the presence of a range of differentiable terrains on Charon, the largest moon of Pluto,…
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…
We study the evolution of debris created in the giant impacts expected during the final stages of terrestrial planet formation. The starting point is the debris created in a simulation of the Moon-forming impact. The dynamical evolution is…
Most of Mars' ancient sedimentary rocks by volume are in wind-eroded sedimentary mounds, but the connections between mound form and wind erosion are unclear. We perform mesoscale simulations of different crater and mound morphologies to…
The early thermal evolution of Moon has been numerically simulated to understand the magnitude of the impact induced heating and the initially stored thermal energy of the accreting Moonlets. The main objective of the present study is to…
The earliest stage of the evolution of a fully assembled planet is profoundly affected by a number of basin-forming impacts large enough to change the dynamics of its deeper interior. These impacts are in some cases quite closely spaced and…