Current bombardment of the Earth-Moon system: Emphasis on cratering asymmetries

Details Current bombardment of the Earth-Moon system: Emphasis on cratering asymmetries Current bombardment of the Earth-Moon system: Emphasis on cratering asymmetries

Aug 2009

adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=2009icar..202..371g&link_type=abstract

Icarus, Volume 202, Issue 2, p. 371-382.

Computer Science

13

Scientific paper

We calculate the current spatial distribution of projectile delivery to the Earth and Moon using numerical orbital dynamics simulations of candidate impactors drawn from a debiased Near-Earth Object (NEO) model. We examine the latitude distribution of impactor sites and find that for both the Earth and Moon there is a small deficiency of time-averaged impact rates at the poles. The ratio between deliveries within 30° of the pole to that of a 30° band centered on the equator is small for Earth (<5%) (0.958±0.001) and somewhat greater for the Moon (˜10%) (0.903±0.005). The terrestrial arrival results are examined to determine the degree of AM/PM asymmetry to compare with the PM excess shown in meteorite fall times. We find that the average lunar impact velocity is 20 km/s, which has ramifications in converting observed crater densities to impactor size distributions. We determine that current crater production on the leading hemisphere of the Moon is 1.28±0.01 that of the trailing when considering the ratio of craters within 30° of the apex to those within 30° of the antapex and that there is virtually no nearside-farside asymmetry, in agreement with observations of rayed craters. As expected, the degree of leading-trailing asymmetry increases when the Moon's orbital distance is decreased.

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