Elkins-Tanton Linda T, Bercovici David
Department of Terrestrial Magnetism, Carnegie Institution for Science, Washington DC, USA
Department of Geology and Geophysics, Yale University, New Haven, CT, USA.
Philos Trans A Math Phys Eng Sci. 2014 Sep 13;372(2024):20130240. doi: 10.1098/rsta.2013.0240.
The lack of contraction features on the Moon has been used to argue that the Moon underwent limited secular cooling, and thus had a relatively cool initial state. A cool early state in turn limits the depth of the lunar magma ocean. Recent GRAIL gravity measurements, however, suggest that dikes were emplaced in the lower crust, requiring global lunar expansion. Starting from the magma ocean state, we show that solidification of the lunar magma ocean would most likely result in expansion of the young lunar crust, and that viscous relaxation of the crust would prevent early tectonic features of contraction or expansion from being recorded permanently. The most likely process for creating the expansion recorded by the dikes is melting during cumulate overturn of the newly solidified lunar mantle.
月球上缺乏收缩特征,这一点被用来证明月球经历的长期冷却有限,因此初始状态相对较冷。而较冷的早期状态反过来又限制了月球岩浆海洋的深度。然而,最近的圣杯号重力测量表明,岩脉侵入了月球下地壳,这意味着月球发生了全球性的膨胀。从岩浆海洋状态开始,我们表明,月球岩浆海洋的固化很可能导致年轻的月球地壳膨胀,并且地壳的粘性松弛会阻止收缩或膨胀的早期构造特征被永久记录下来。造成岩脉所记录的膨胀的最可能过程是新固化的月球地幔堆积翻转期间的熔融。