Chinese space agency reveals Beijing gifted Russia, France lunar soil. Here's why

The Chinese space agency, on Monday (April 24), revealed that it recently gifted Russia and France small samples of lunar soil collected during the fifth mission of China’s Lunar Exploration Programme in 2020. Earlier this month, France was presented with 1.5 grams, said Guan Feng from the China National Space Administration (CNSA), as per South China Morning Post (SCMP).

Russia and China exchange lunar soil

The Chinese space agency also revealed that back in February 2022, during Russian President Vladimir Putin’s visit to Beijing, he was given lunar soil samples weighing 1.5 grams for “scientific research purposes,” said the CNSA on its website.

In turn, when Chinese President Xi Jinping went to Russia for a visit, earlier this year, he was given 1.5 grams of lunar soil collected by the first Soviet probe, the Luna-16 in 1970, to perform a sample return mission to the Moon, reported Russian news agency Tass.

The announcement was made by Guan while addressing an audience during the opening ceremony of this year’s Space Day of China in Hefei, on April 24.

China gives France lunar soil

Additionally, a similar amount oflunar soil was presented to French President Emmanuel Macron, earlier this month, during his visit to Beijing.

Scientific value of the exchanges

A French geologist Thomas Smith at the Chinese Academy of Sciences in Beijing said this is “proof of the strong friendship and partnership between our two countries” referring to the gift from China to France, reported the SCMP. Notably, he was the first foreign national to receive samples collected during the Chinese mission.

The geologist also noted how the samples collected during the Chinese mission in 2020 were the first ones since the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA)’s Apollo and the Soviet Luna missions. “They represent the youngest-ever lunar soils brought back to Earth. Therefore, they are of high scientific value and give insights into the events that happened late in the moon’s history,” said Smith.

Smith, who received some 400 milligrams of the sample and two tiny particles for the study said he used them to measure the concentrations of noble gases such as helium and neon. The geologist also said that he would look at how the moon has been impacted by various cosmic events on the moon over the aeons.

China’s Chang’e-5 mission

In 2020, CNSA launched its fifth mission of China’s Lunar Exploration Programme called Chang’e 5 which collected a total of 1,731g of lunar samples around 23 days later. After the samples, which are said to be some two billion years old, reached Earth the CNSA announced that lunar soil analysis would be conducted with international cooperation.

The recent findings, based on the samples collected during the 2020 mission, indicated that the moon still had active volcanoes two billion years ago which is more recent than previously thought.

The Apollo and Luna rocks are said to be somewhere between three and 4.4 billion years old. As of now, researchers in China as well as several countries like Australia, France, Germany, Russia, the United Kingdom, the United States, and so on, are analysing the lunar samples collected.

(With inputs from agencies)

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