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Lunar surface composition and solar wind‐Induced secondary ion mass spectrometry
Author(s) -
Elphic R. C.,
Funsten H. O.,
Barraclough B. L.,
McComas D. J.,
Paffett M. T.,
Vaniman D. T.,
Heiken G.
Publication year - 1991
Publication title -
geophysical research letters
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 2.007
H-Index - 273
eISSN - 1944-8007
pISSN - 0094-8276
DOI - 10.1029/91gl02669
Subject(s) - regolith , secondary ion mass spectrometry , ion , solar wind , sputtering , astrobiology , lunar soil , mass spectrometry , static secondary ion mass spectrometry , materials science , analytical chemistry (journal) , environmental science , chemistry , physics , environmental chemistry , magnetic field , nanotechnology , thin film , organic chemistry , chromatography , quantum mechanics
The Moon has no strong global magnetic field and only a tenuous atmosphere, so solar wind ions (∼95% H + , 5% He ++ ) directly bombard the lunar surface, sputtering atoms and secondary ions from the exposed grains of the regolith. The secondary ions potentially provide surface composition information through secondary ion mass spectrometry (SIMS), a standard laboratory surface composition analysis technique. In this paper we report the results of laboratory SIMS experiments on lunar soil simulants using solar wind‐like ions. We find that H + and He ++ , while not efficient sputterers, nevertheless produce significant fluxes of secondary lunar ions, including Na + , Mg + , Al + , Si + , K + , Ca + , Ti + , Mn + and Fe + . We predict that lunar surface secondary‐ion fluxes range between ∼10 and 10 4 ions cm −2 s −1 , depending on the species.