Chandrayaan-3 lands in one of the oldest craters on the Moon. Here is what the Rover found

Chandrayaan-3, India's latest lunar mission, has successfully landed in one of the Moon's oldest craters, estimated to be 3.85 billion years old. 

Scientists from the Physical Research Laboratory and Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) confirmed the landing on Saturday, stating that the crater dates back to the Nectarian period, an ancient chapter in the Moon’s history.

The mission’s Pragyan rover has ventured into a previously unexplored region of the Moon. This is a unique geological setting where no other missions have landed. 

The images captured by Pragyan are the first-ever on-site visuals from this latitude and provide crucial insights into the Moon’s evolution," said S. Vijayan, associate professor at the Physical Research Laboratory.

A crater is created when an asteroid impacts a planetary surface, displacing material known as ejecta. The Pragyan rover has revealed that one-half of the crater where Chandrayaan-3 landed is buried under ejecta from the nearby South Pole-Aitken basin, the largest known impact basin on the Moon. This indicates that the landing site is a mix of ancient lunar surface and material displaced by previous impacts.

The images captured by the rover and satellites show that the landing site, named Shiv Shakti Point by the Indian government, is composed of material deposited from various regions across the Moon. The rover also observed ejecta from a distant impact crater, suggesting that the surface in this area is a complex blend of debris from multiple locations.

Chandrayaan-3 made its historic soft landing on the Moon's south pole on August 23, 2023, becoming the first mission to touch down in this region. The findings from this mission are expected to provide valuable data on the Moon’s geological history and its surface composition, further advancing our understanding of Earth's closest celestial neighbor.