Skip to main content

Thank you for visiting nature.com. You are using a browser version with limited support for CSS. To obtain the best experience, we recommend you use a more up to date browser (or turn off compatibility mode in Internet Explorer). In the meantime, to ensure continued support, we are displaying the site without styles and JavaScript.

  • News & Views
  • Published:

It's not easy to make the Moon

Nature volume 389, pages 327–328 (1997)Cite this article

Theory has it that the Moon grew within a disk of material splashed out of the Earth by a body the size of Mars. According to new calculations, however, the impacting body was at least twice that size.

Earth's Moon is one of the most peculiar bodies in the Solar System. It is slightly more than 1 per cent as massive as the Earth, its primary, whereas (excluding the tiny Pluto-Charon ‘double planet’) all other moons are less than one-fortieth of 1 per cent as massive as their primaries. Moreover, the Moon's composition is quite unusual — it is an extremely dry place, devoid of water and other volatile substances; yet it is anomalously low in density for a body in the inner Solar System, because it is depleted in iron relative to a solar-composition mix of refractory (high-condensation-temperature) elements.

This is a preview of subscription content, access via your institution

Access options

Buy this article

  • Purchase on Springer Link
  • Instant access to full article PDF
Buy now

Prices may be subject to local taxes which are calculated during checkout

Figure 1: Earth and its Moon, as imaged from the Galileo spacecraft.

JPL/NASA

References

  1. Darwin, G. H. Phil. Trans. R. Soc. II 170, 447–538 (1879).

    Google Scholar 

  2. Boss, A. P. & Peale, S. J. in Origin of the Moon (eds Hartmann, W. K., Phillips, R. J. & Taylor, G. J.) 59-101 (Lunar & Planetary Institutee, Houston, TX, 1986).

  3. Ruskol, E. L. The Moon 6, 190–201 (1973).

    Google Scholar 

  4. Hartmann, W. K. & Davis, D. R. Icarus 24, 504–515 (1975).

    Google Scholar 

  5. Cameron, A. G. W. & Ward, W. R. Lunar Sci. VII, 120–122 (1976).

    Google Scholar 

  6. Hartmann, W. K., Phillips, R. J. & Taylor, G. J. (eds) Origin of the Moon (Lunar & Planetary Institutee, Houston, TX, 1986).

  7. Benz, W., Slattery, W. L. & Cameron, A. G. W. Icarus 71, 30–45 (1987).

    Google Scholar 

  8. Cameron, A. G. W. Icarus 126, 126–137 (1997).

    Google Scholar 

  9. Ida, S., Canup, R. M. & Stewart, G. R. Nature 389, 353–357 (1997).

    Article  ADS  CAS  Google Scholar 

  10. Wetherill, G. W. Science 228, 877–879 (1985).

    Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. the Space Science Division, NASA Ames Research Center, Moffett Field, 94035, California, USA

    Jack J. Lissauer

Authors
  1. Jack J. Lissauer
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Lissauer, J. It's not easy to make the Moon. Nature 389, 327–328 (1997). https://doi.org/10.1038/38596

Download citation

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/38596

Search

Advanced search

Quick links

Nature Briefing

Sign up for the Nature Briefing newsletter — what matters in science, free to your inbox daily.

Get the most important science stories of the day, free in your inbox. Sign up for Nature Briefing