Moonrocks - how to differentiate them from others?

[Allan F]

Does anybody have a source for information about this? I'm interested in learning about the differences due to the gravitational environment where they cooled  off.

[Luke Pemberton]

Does anybody have a source for information about this? I'm interested in learning about the differences due to the gravitational environment where they cooled  off.

Most interesting are the glass beads formed on the moon. They provide a whole wealth of evidence for lunar origin, such as being formed in a vacuum in low gravity. They also contain nanoparticles of iron in the outer layers that can only be explained by space weathering.

Another interesting facet of moon geology, related to nanoparticles, can be found in this article.

http://phys.org/news/2012-06-nanoparticles-moon-glass-weird-lunar.html

While not directly related to your question, there are many differences between moon rocks and their terrestrial cousins which can only be explained by formation in the lunar environment.

The whole faking moon rocks from a melt in NASA's special ceramics laboratory shows the ignorance of Kaysing. If rocks were made from a melt the evidence would be in convection currents showing up in the rock (amongst many things). Something that HWSNBN glosses over.

[onebigmonkey]

I am fortunate enough to have, in my ever expanding collection of original NASA and other Apollo related books and publications, some of the Proceedings of the Lunar Science Conferences that examined the Apollo 11 & 12 samples. I don't pretend to understand much of them, but they are fantastic to look at!

They aren't that expensive. and like all of the books I have they are great evidence that the data from Apollo have been freely available long before the internet

[gwiz]

Does anybody have a source for information about this? I'm interested in learning about the differences due to the gravitational environment where they cooled  off.

Try this link, lots of info though no details on gravity effects:
http://meteorites.wustl.edu/lunar/howdoweknow.htm

[Count Zero]

You can find detailed geological analysis at the Lunar Sample Compendium.  Unfortunately, it's not written for laymen.  You might check the Scientific American archive.  Their articles are usually detailed, yet accessible to non-experts.

[Dalhousie]

I don't think that there is anything in Moon rocks that shows they formed in lower gravity.  I have not read anything and I specially quizzed Ross Taylor, whose office used to be two doors from mine, about this.

They are 1) chemically distinctive from terrestrial rocks, especially in relation to their rare earth elements, and

2) Depleted in the volatile metals like zinc, mercury etc.

3) Moon rocks mostly much older than terrestrial rocks (>3.5 Ga)

4) They almost always completely anhydrous, both in terms of primary water and secondary alteration.   

5) They almost always show shock metamorphism and brecciation to varying degrees, very rare in terrestrial rocks.

6) The noble gas ratios are quite different from terrestrial rocks and non-lunar meteorites.

7) Their surfaces are impregnated with solar wind gases, as are regolith samples. 

Moon rock surfaces pocked by micrometeorites, and

9) are generally spattered by impact glasses (which also makes up much of the regolith, including glassy aggultinates, a rock unknown from Earth). 

1-6) differentiate lunar rocks from terrestrial examples and also meteorites

7-9) Differentiate the lunar samples (both Apollo and Luna) from all meteorites, including lunar meteorites.  All meteorites also have fusion crusts, absent from the Apollo and Luna samples and regolith lithologies are missing.