What are lunar swirls hiding? NASA to dig in and find out

The surface of the moon has magnetic swirls the origin of which the scientists have been trying to understand. Now a study suggests that swirls seen on the lunar surface might have been caused by magma activity below the surface. The lunar swirls are being magnetised by something as these seem to have been formed by magnetised rocks that deflect or redirect solar wind particles. The lunar swirls run for hundreds of miles on some parts of the moon's surface, images sent back by NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) show.

Moon does not have a magnetic field, and so scientists have been working to learn more about the origins of these magnetic swirls created by the rocks.

The scientists studying the magnetic anomaly went two ways about it - either some kind of an impact could have caused these swirls, or there is a lava field below the surface which is creating magnetic anomalies as it cools down.

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However, the impact theory doesn't seem to hold as Michael J. Krawczynski, co-author of the study and an associate professor of earth, environmental and planetary sciences at Washington University in St. Louis, says that there are "some swirls where we're just not sure how an impact could create that shape and that size of thing."

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So they conducted experiments to understand if magma conditions are possible. "Our analog experiments showed that at lunar conditions, we could create the magnetizable material that we needed. So, it's plausible that these swirls are caused by subsurface magma," Krawczynski said in a statement.

He adds that the magma needs to have high titanium for the theory to be true. "We have seen hints of this reaction creating iron metal in lunar meteorites and in lunar samples from Apollo. But all of those samples are surface lava flows, and our study shows cooling underground should significantly enhance these metal-forming reactions," Krawczynski said.

NASA to landrover on lunar swirl

To learn more about lunar swirls, NASA is gearing up to send a rover to the lunar swirl called Reiner Gamma in 2025. This would be a part of the Lunar Vertex mission and aims to examine the lunar surface and the different surface features.

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"If we could just drill down, we could see if this reaction was happening," Krawczynski said. "That would be great, but it’s not possible yet. Right now, we’re stuck with the surface."