China Says It Discovered a New Lunar Mineral
China has reportedly discovered a new lunar mineral in samples retrieved from the moon in 2020.
The official Xinhua News Agency reports(Opens in a new window) that the mineral, Changesite-(Y), was jointly revealed by the China National Space Administration and China Atomic Energy Authority on Sept. 9 after it was discovered by a subsidiary of the China National Nuclear Corporation (CNNC).
South China Morning Post reports(Opens in a new window) that researchers from the Beijing Research Institute of Uranium Geology "isolated a single crystalline particle of the material from more than 140,000 lunar particles using hi-tech processes, including X-ray diffraction," per an official with the CNNC.
Xinhua describes Changesite-(Y) as "a kind of colorless transparent columnar crystal" that was "discovered from an analysis of lunar basalt particles" collected by the Chang'e-5 mission in 2020. It has reportedly been recognized as a new mineral by the International Mineralogical Association.
The discovery of Changesite-(Y) makes China the third country—after the US and Russia—to find a new mineral on the moon. SCMP reports that it's the sixth lunar mineral to be discovered.
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