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A moon will raise a tidal bulge in the object it orbits (the primary) due to the differential gravitational force across diameter of the primary. If a moon is revolving in the same direction as the planet's rotation and the planet is rotating faster than the orbital period of the moon, the bulge will constantly be pulled ahead of the moon.
This explained the lack of water, as the vapor cloud was too hot for water to condense; the similarity in composition, since the Moon had formed from part of the Earth; the lower density, since the Moon had formed from the Earth's crust and mantle, rather than its core; and the Moon's unusual orbit, since an oblique strike would have imparted a ...
The Moon's heavily cratered far-side. The origin of the Moon is usually explained by a Mars-sized body striking the Earth, creating a debris ring that eventually collected into a single natural satellite, the Moon, but there are a number of variations on this giant-impact hypothesis, as well as alternative explanations, and research continues into how the Moon came to be formed.
Animation of collision between Earth (blue) and Theia (black), forming the Moon (red and gray). Bodies are not to scale. According to the giant impact hypothesis, Theia orbited the Sun, nearly along the orbit of the proto-Earth, by staying close to one or the other of the Sun-Earth system's two more stable Lagrangian points (i.e., either L 4 or ...
The Moon is Earth's only natural satellite. It orbits at an average distance of 384,400 km (238,900 mi), about 30 times the diameter of Earth. Tidal forces between Earth and the Moon have synchronized the Moon's orbital period (lunar month) with its rotation period at 29.5 Earth days, causing the same side of the Moon to always face Earth.
Artist's depiction of a collision between two planetary bodies. Such an impact between Earth and a Mars-sized object likely formed the Moon.. The giant-impact hypothesis, sometimes called the Theia Impact, is an astrogeology hypothesis for the formation of the Moon first proposed in 1946 by Canadian geologist Reginald Daly.
41 of the 118 known elements have names associated with, or specifically named for, places around the world or among astronomical objects. 32 of these have names tied to the places on Earth, and the other nine are named after to Solar System objects: helium for the Sun; tellurium for the Earth; selenium for the Moon; mercury (indirectly), uranium, neptunium and plutonium after their respective ...
Before 4.56 Ga, the presolar nebula was a dense molecular cloud consisting of hydrogen and helium gas with dispersed dust grains. When the Sun ignited and entered its T-Tauri phase, it melted nearby dust grains. Some of the melt droplets were incorporated into chondrites as small spherical objects called chondrules. [12]