It looks like the Moon may be a useful step on the way to Mars for an unexpected reason — Moon Storms: Researchers Learn New from Old Apollo Experiment
LEAM’s three-decade-old data are so intriguing, they’re now being reexamined by several independent groups of NASA and university scientists. Gary Olhoeft, professor of geophysics at the Colorado School of Mines in Golden, is one of them:
“To everyone’s surprise,” says Olhoeft, “LEAM saw a large number of particles every morning, mostly coming from the east or west–rather than above or below–and mostly slower than speeds expected for lunar ejecta.”
What could cause this? Stubbs has an idea: “The dayside of the moon is positively charged; the nightside is negatively charged.” At the interface between night and day, he explains, “electrostatically charged dust would be pushed across the terminator sideways,” by horizontal electric fields.