https://www.popsci.com/science/moon-age ... 17-sample/
The moon is our closest neighbor in space and the only celestial body humans have set foot on, yet we are still learning about it. In fact, Earth’s moon might actually be 40 million years older than scientists previously believed. By conducting an atom-by-atom analysis on crystals that were brought back by Apollo astronauts in 1972, a team of geochemists and plenary scientists now calculate that the igneous orb is at least 4.46 billion years old. The findings are described in a study published today in the journal Geochemical Perspectives Letters.
Intertwined fates
Based on samples recovered from the moon’s surface, we know that it formed more than four billion years ago when a giant object the size of Mars crashed into a very young Earth. The largest piece of the planet that broke off during that collision became our moon, and has been intertwined with the solar system ever since.
[Related: How old is Earth?]
“Life on Earth has evolved with the moon, and the moon has an influence on life on Earth,” study co-author and cosmochemist Philipp Heck tells PopSci. “It inspires us, which is reflected in cultural heritage, but it also has other beneficial effects like stabilizing Earth’s rotational axis.”
Heck is a curator for the meteorite collection at the Field Museum in Chicago and a professor at the University of Chicago. He says that studying the moon also helps us understand our own planet because of the topographical differences.
“Earth’s surface is much, much younger because there’s so much geologic activity [here] from volcanism and weathering,” explains Heck. “The moon’s surface is essentially an archive of solar system dynamics. This is a record that we don’t have on Earth, but our planet’s evolution is tied to these impacts that happened in the early solar system.”