BENGALURU, October 1 — Scientists from the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) and the Physical Research Laboratory (PRL), Ahmedabad, on Thursday published peer-reviewed findings establishing direct in-situ geochemical evidence of an ancient Lunar Magma Ocean (LMO) at the Moon's high-latitude southern polar region, gathered by the Chandrayaan-3 Pragyan rover.
The research paper, based on compositional data gathered across 23 discrete sampling locations around the 'Shiv Shakti Point' by the Alpha Particle X-ray Spectrometer (APXS), verified high concentrations of Ferroan Anorthosite (FAN) minerals, providing empirical support that the primordial lunar crust crystallized from a global buoyant magma ocean approximately 4.5 billion years ago.
ISRO planetary scientists noted that the findings mark humanity's first direct in-situ geochemical measurement at such high lunar latitudes (69.37° S, 32.35° E), resolving long-standing astronomical debates concerning whether the south polar highlands shared compositional uniformity with equatorial samples brought by earlier Apollo and Luna missions.
The structural components of the Chandrayaan-3 mission (LVM3 launch vehicle, Vikram Lander, Pragyan Rover payloads including APXS and LIBS), the Lunar Magma Ocean hypothesis, and India's planetary exploration roadmap (Chandrayaan-4 sample return, Gaganyaan, Venus Orbiter Mission) represent core topics in UPSC Civil Services (GS-III: Science and Technology) and engineering competitive exams.