Chang'e-6 lunar samples reveal 2.83-billion-year-old basalt with depleted mantle source

The moon has a global dichotomy, with its near and far sides having different geomorphology, topography, chemical composition, crustal thickness, and evidence of volcanism. To better understand this dichotomy, Professor Xu Yigang's team from the Guangzhou Institute of Geochemistry of the Chinese Academy of Sciences investigated lunar soil samples from the far side South Pole-Aitken (SPA) Basin of the moon returned by the Chang'e-6 mission.