HAIFA: Scientists from Technion Institute of Technology in Haifa conduct study that provides answer to why earth and moon are almost identical – question scientists have tried to answer for 30 years.
For years, scientists have believed that the moon was formed after the Earth and a huge object the size of Mars collided about 4.45 billion years ago.
“In terms of composition, the Earth and moon are almost twins, their compositions differing by at most few parts in a million,” Dr. Alessandra Mastrobuono-Battisti, an astrophysicist at the Technion Israel Institute of Technology in Haifa, told Space.com. “This contradiction has cast a long shadow on the giant-impact model.”
Dr. Alessandra Mastrobuono-Battisti, an astrophysicist at the Technion, led a group of Israeli scientists in a study that found a way to explain why the Earth and the moon are almost identical.
According to the study conducted at the Technion, the moon resembles Earth so closely because it collided with a large body known as Theia. According to the Israeli scientists, Theia has a similar chemical makeup to Earth, and thus this would explain the discrepancy.
