Is the moon an electric minefield?

The dream of setting up human colonies on the moon has another hurdle. Scientists at NASA's Lunar Science Insititute team have found out that craters on the moon may be electrically charged upto hundreds of volts! The craters were recently found to contain water frozen as ice. Now researchers at NASA's DREAM (Dynamic Response of the Environment at the Moon) project have observed that solar wind, a harsh wind blowing from the sun, across the moon's rocky surface may cause the craters to have pools of electricity too. Considering the large amount of craters the moon has, it looks like the moon is one big electric mine-field.

The researchers created computer generated simulations of the moon's surface to understand the complex environment. Solar wind, which hits the moon much like a heavy gust of wind on the earth, is composed of positively charged and negatively charged electric particles. Since the negatively charged particles are smaller than the positive ones, they rush inside the craters first. This creates an imbalance of charges between the rim and the inside of the crater, like the two ends of a battery, and leads to built up of electricity. The negatively charged solar wind particles in the crater repel and push out negatively charged moon-dust inside leading to floating dust clouds.

This electric activity of the craters can hamper further lunar research by causing short outs of sensitive equipment sent on the moon. If a manned mission goes to the moon, the areas near the craters are likely to have clusters of charged and sticky dust particles which can cause scuffing of spacesuits. The air inside the spacecrafts may also become hazardous over time due to the charged dust particles.

The DREAM team is now building more complex, 3-dimensional models for gaining a better understanding of the moon's surface. This is in preparation for the LADEE (Lunar Atmosphere and Dust Environment Explorer) mission in 2012. Looks like NASA's mission has a new set of problems to battle on the restless frontiers of the moon.