SIS member William Thompson emails to say Robin Canup, a space scientist with the Southwest Research Institute in Colorado has published a piece in the journal Nature proposing a mission to Venus that he considered would help understand the development of our Moon. She suggests the current theories on how the Moon came about seem to rely too much on data from Mars, and that might obscure the real story of the Moon. Tom Elliot and Sarah Stewart offer their own opinion on the matter – in the News and Views in the same issue of the journal. This story can be found at http://phys.org/print305447742.html
At www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/12/131205185611.htm … instruments onboard NASA missions are proving their worth – such as the ability to take soil samples and test the atmosphere, and look in detail at rocks.
At www.sciencedaily.com/videos/2006/0207-back-to-the-moon.htm … Hubble is used to spot oxygen rich soil on the Moon. In fact, there is so much oxygen up there it could be used as rocket fuel – or coule be tapped by astronauts to aid their breathing.