‘Earth’s Second Moon’ may have formed in a crater on natural satellite

In 2016, astronomers discovered a strange asteroid in the Milky Way. A mysterious object called Kamo’oalewa, which may have formed from a piece of our Moon. A team of scientists from Tsinghua University in China used data on the rock to try to better understand its origin; Our natural satellite may indeed be your birthplace.

In a paper published in the journal Nature, researchers performed simulations that revealed features of a crater corresponding to those of Kamo’oalewa. The results indicate that the asteroid may have originated in the Giordano Bruno crater located on the far side of the Moon. – this name was given in honor of the philosopher, mathematician and theologian of the same name.

Scientists believe this Perhaps Kamo’oalewa is not the only minimoon close to Earth, as it is common for such collisions to create larger numbers of objects.; They claim that the asteroid formed only a few million years ago. In 2023, another group of researchers published a paper trying to solve the mystery by linking the asteroid to a possible birth on the lunar surface.

“We investigate processes of impact-induced migration of lunar fragments into Earth co-orbital space and provide support for the possible origin of Kamo’oalewa in the formation of the Giordano Bruno crater several million years ago. “This would directly connect a particular asteroid in space to its main crater on the Moon, revealing the existence of smaller asteroids composed of as yet undiscovered lunar material in near-Earth space,” he explains.

Kamo’oalewa: ‘Earth’s second moon’

According to scientists, The first evidence of its relationship with our natural satellite is that the asteroid has colors similar to those of the Moon; Also, the reflection of light from the rock surface is similar. After analyzing these features and comparing them with data on Kamo’alewa’s orbital properties, they concluded that it may be associated with both celestial bodies.

The new study also used lunar impact models to try to understand the origin of the asteroid. Thus, they realized that very few craters met the size and age criteria of the cosmic object. Such cosmic rocks have not remained close to Earth for more than 100 million years, so they must be younger than that. Kamo’oalewa is probably between 10 and 100 million years old.

“Of course, the largest and youngest craters are likely sources because they produce more fragments that escape and still remain in space or in the Earth’s co-orbital region. And in fact, Giordano Bruno is the only possible source crater that meets this criterion,” the study adds.

In any case, it is important to emphasize that the study only puts forward a hypothesis regarding the appearance of the asteroid. Later, There is still no concrete conclusion as to whether Kamo’oalewa really came from the Moon.

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