In general, the current consensus is that for a celestial body to be able to harbor life forms - as we know it - it must have some basic characteristics, the presence of water in its liquid form being the most important of them. For the moon, which in addition to not containing the liquid abundantly and easily accessible (there is water there, but mainly in the form of ice deposits at the poles and molecules), is devoid of atmosphere, and does not offer an environment that we can Call it cozy.

(NASA 1)

However, according to Kara Goldfarb of All That Is Interesting, a new study - published by researchers at Washington State University recently in the journal Astrobiology - suggests that Earth's companion may already have harbored life forms.

Least Inhospitable Past

According to Kara, scientists conducted a series of analyzes on materials collected on the moon, such as rocks and lunar soil, and concluded that during two distinct periods, the star's surface may have provided the necessary conditions for the emergence of simple life forms. Researchers believe that the first of these periods occurred shortly after the moon's formation, about 4 billion years ago, and the second, around 3.5 billion years ago, when volcanic activity on the satellite was at its peak.

(NASA 2)

At these time intervals, as scientists theorize, the star may have released large amounts of superheated gases from its interior onto the lunar surface, including water vapor. If so, puddles may have formed there - and if there was liquid water and a significant atmosphere, and both remained present for long periods of time, the Moon may have been habitable, if only temporarily. .

We know that the satellite housed (and still does), and there is evidence that it, when it was still "young", billions of years ago, had a magnetic field - which would have functioned as a kind of protective shield for people. possible life forms that might have appeared on the moon, mainly against the action of the solar winds and cosmic radiation.

(Wikimedia Commons / NASA / Bill Anders)

And there is one more thing: shortly after the formation of the Solar System, Earth and Moon were the targets of endless collisions of space rocks. So scientists theorize that impact fragments may have been transferred from our planet to the satellite - carrying hitchhike earthly microbes. And if these organisms found the puddles, there is a possibility that they proliferated until the moon became the dry, uninhabitable star it is today.

Obviously, this is all a theory - and nothing that the researchers suggest can be proven if no physical evidence is found that there were life forms on the moon. But it's still an interesting possibility, don't you agree?

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