some more about that” (Chu, 2014). Ian O’Neill writing for Discovery News summarized the findings, saying of the lava-filled cracks “researchers have found compelling evidence that it was formed in the wake of a mega volcanic eruption and not the location of a massive asteroid strike” (O’Neill, 2014). For the thermal expansion cracks to form, the heat has to be generated inside the moon much faster than it can be conducted out to the crust of the moon. Slow and gradual nuclear decay over billions of years would not result in thermal expansion cracks, since the heat would have time to become relatively evenly distributed between the interior and the crust over such a timescale. Nor would slow and gradual heating account for the very large quantities of lava that filled these cracks. So these secular scientists remained puzzled at these findings. Figure 1. Moon as seen from Earth (left); the topography of the Moon (center); GRAIL’s gravity map of the Moon, showing huge blue cracks, forming roughly a square around the lunar maria (right) Figure 2. Thorium map of the Moon showing increased concentrations of Thorium in the main maria regions on the near side (left). These lavas apparently became enriched in mantle incompatible elements while they melted, causing further heating of the magmas and contributing to the thermal expansion cracking around the perimeter of the maria. STERNBERG Craters and cracks 2023 ICC 12
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