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The moon's reputation as a cold, inactive orb may be undeserved. A new look at Apollo15 photographs revealed crisp features inside the Ina structure that suggest relative youth. A general absence of asteroid impact craters on the structure's floor also indicates that it is no more than 10 million years old. Satellite spectral data show reflective mineral bands deep in one of Ina's craters that would typically dull over time. A rapid release of gases sometime in the past one million to 10 million years evidently blew dust from the surface and revealed the young features in Ina. Study author Peter Schultz of Brown University says that even if volcanism on the orb has ceased, its by-products are still bubbling up to the surface. The report appeared in the November 9 Nature.
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