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Lunar sample tells ancient story with help of Curtin’s world-class facilities
Curtin University researchers have helped uncover the four billion year old story of a lunar sample brought from the Moon to Earth, by the manned Apollo 17 mission more than 50 years ago.
Apollo 17 Mission: NASA/ Gene Cernan
The global research collaboration, involving scientists from the UK, Canada, Sweden and Australia, aimed to analyse the ancient rock sample through a modern lens to find out its age, which crater it came from and its geological trajectory.
That modern lens was provided, in part, by both Curtin’s Geoscience Atom Probe Facility* and Space Science and Technology Centre* (SSTC) where the research team was able to use the most advanced analytical equipment to accurately date the sample and perform sophisticated numerical impact simulations to determine the source crater.