Now there are two rocks, right there
I got to put this one in your bag before I can get it
Ok
These have been described as...
...the most expensive rocks in the world
Until NASA’s Apollo moon missions...
...they’d laid on the lunar surface for millions of years...
...undisturbed by humans
Coming off this rock here, but it looks like caliche
From 1969 to 1972
The Eagle has landed
There were six Apollo missions...
...which returned to Earth with samples
It was hoped they’d uncover secrets about the Moon...
...they ended up teaching scientists a lot about the Earth too
Nine containers of lunar samples were brought back to Earth
Scientists studying the rocks...
...learnt a great deal about the many impacts...
...early in the Moon’s development
These created huge craters...
...some the size of large countries
Ancient volcanic eruptions then filled some of these basins...
...with vast plains of lava...
...creating the dry seas...
...that can be seen by humans on Earth...
...billions of years later
But the moon rocks also revealed...
...the biggest impact...
...was the one that created the Moon itself
Scientists found the Moon rocks to be surprisingly...
...perhaps disappointingly, like those on Earth
It turns out that the Earth and the Moon...
...are chemically very similar indeed, as if twins
It was this revelation that led to a game-changing idea...
...the giant impact theory
The latest version of this theory...
...involves the new idea of a synestia
In this theory...
...the impact fills nearby space with a doughnut of hot vapour
Both the Moon and Earth are formed...
...from the magma rain that resulted
The gravitational pull...
...which binds the Moon and Earth to each other...
...became the main cause...
...of the rise and fall of the Earth’s ocean tides
Scientists believe these tides could have been crucial...
...for the evolution of animal life on Earth...
...by offering a route from under the sea to above it
For almost 50 years...
...no human has returned to the Moon
Now missions are being planned to its unexplored territories
Just as the United States was the first nation to reach the Moon...
...in the 20th century...
...so too will we be the first nation to return astronauts...
...to the Moon in the 21st century
The hope of the next generation of scientists...
...is that by studying new samples of rock...
...they can unlock many more of the Moon’s secrets...
...and even some of the Earth’s