When the moon first appeared how much closer to the earth was it than it is today?That newborn moon — a ball of molten rock covered in a magma ocean — was nearly 16 times closer to Earth than it is today. As it cooled, the moon backed away, retreating thousands of miles into ...
Io, and Venus are fed by subsurface molten rock. On Earth, the lava comes up from the mantle (which is the layer under the surface). Once there's enough molten rock — called magma — and enough pressure
it has a thick crust made up almost entirely of a light-colored mineral called feldspar. Feldspar is the main material that makes up the bright areas we can see on the moon today, also known as the lunar highlands. The feldspar crystallized as the magma ocean cooled, and was light...