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Evolution, Lunar: From Magma Ocean to Crust Formation

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Encyclopedia of Lunar Science

Introduction

The lunar crust provides a record of the planetary formation and early evolutionary processes and contains a wealth of information about the origin and evolution of the Earth-Moon system (e.g., Taylor 1982; NRC 2007; Canup 2008, 2012; Cuk and Stewart 2012; Young et al. 2016). Understanding these processes is crucial for the reconstruction of the early evolutionary stages of the Earth, e.g., the early geological evolution of a terrestrial planet, inner Solar System impact bombardment, and the solar and galactic environment throughout the last 4.5 billion years (Ga) (e.g., NRC 2007; Crawford et al. 2012).

Our knowledge of the lunar highland crust has advanced enormously. Studies of lunar meteorites; experimental and computational studies; remote sensing of mineralogy, chemistry, and topography of the lunar surface; new gravity data; geochronology; geochemistry, especially isotopic constraints; and the abundances and source reservoirs of lunar volatiles have brought, and...

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Acknowledgments

JG acknowledges NASA grant NNX15AU25G; KHJ acknowledges STFC Grant ST/M001253/1 and Royal Society grant RS/UF140190. Some of the material used was modified from text presented in K. Joy’s Ph.D. thesis (Joy 2007), for which she thanks Ian Crawford for his help and support.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences, Rutgers University, 610 Taylor Road, Piscataway, NJ, 08854, USA

    Juliane Gross

  2. American Museum of Natural History, New York, NY, 10024, USA

    Juliane Gross

  3. Lunar and Planetary Institute, Houston, TX, 77058, USA

    Juliane Gross

  4. School of Earth and Environmental Sciences, University of Manchester, Manchester, UK

    Katherine H. Joy

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Correspondence to Juliane Gross .

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  1. Prairie View A&M University, Houston, Texas, USA

    Brian Cudnik

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    Jesse Davenport

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Gross, J., Joy, K.H. (2016). Evolution, Lunar: From Magma Ocean to Crust Formation. In: Cudnik, B. (eds) Encyclopedia of Lunar Science. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-05546-6_39-1

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