The fractured Moon: Production and saturation of porosity in the lunar highlands from impact cratering
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Author(s)
Evans, Alexander J.
Melosh, H. Jay
Phillips, Roger J.
Andrews-Hanna, Jeffrey C.
Bierson, Carver J.
Head, James W.
Milbury, Colleen
Neumann, Gregory A.
Nimmo, Francis
Solomon, Sean C.
Date Issued
August 2015
Journal
Geophysical Research Letters
Publisher
American Geophysical Union (AGU)
Citation
Soderblom, Jason M., et al. “The Fractured Moon: Production and Saturation of Porosity in the Lunar Highlands from Impact Cratering.” Geophysical Research Letters, vol. 42, no. 17, Sept. 2015, pp. 6939–44. © 2015 American Geophysical Union
Version
Final published version
Abstract
We have analyzed the Bouguer anomaly (BA) of ∼1200 complex craters in the lunar highlands from Gravity Recovery and Interior Laboratory observations. The BA of these craters is generally negative, though positive BA values are observed, particularly for smaller craters. Crater BA values scale inversely with crater diameter, quantifying how larger impacts produce more extensive fracturing and dilatant bulking. The Bouguer anomaly of craters larger than 93[superscript +47][subscript -19] km in diameter is independent of crater size, indicating that there is a limiting depth to impact-generated porosity, presumably from pore collapse associated with either overburden pressure or viscous flow. Impact-generated porosity of the bulk lunar crust is likely in a state of equilibrium for craters smaller than ∼30 km in diameter, consistent with an ∼8 km thick lunar megaregolith, whereas the gravity signature of larger craters is still preserved and provides new insight into the cratering record of even the oldest lunar surfaces.
MIT Department
Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Earth, Atmospheric, and Planetary Sciences
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Article is made available in accordance with the publisher's policy and may be subject to US copyright law. Please refer to the publisher's site for terms of use.
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DOI of Published Version
https://doi.org/10.1002/2015GL065022
