New research suggests that at one point, the earth can temporarily capture up to half a dozen fragments of the moon, known as minimons, before continuing their trip around the sun.
However, due to their small size and rapid movement, these objects are difficult to detect, reported Space.com.
When impacts occur on the moon, they eject debris in space. Although some larger parts can be launched, most fragments are small – less than 6.5 feet (2 meters) wide and move at high speed. As a general rule, these lunar debris are found in solar orbit, but sometimes, some are briefly captured by the gravity of the earth before resuming its way around the sun, according to a study published in the journal Icarus.
It is “a bit like a square dance, where the partners change regularly and sometimes leave the dance floor for a while,” Robert Jedicke, researcher at the University of Hawaii and principal author of the study, told Space.com.
Although the international astronomical union has not officially defined what a minimon is, previous studies suggest that it refers to an object which is temporarily linked to the earth, completes at least one orbit and is about four times the distance from the earth of the earth during its way.
The minimons can come from various parts of the solar system, but a 2018 study proposed that most come from the asteroid belt located between Mars and Jupiter. However, recent discoveries of minimons with apparent lunar origins question this theory.
In 2016, the Asteroid Pan-Starrs1 investigation telescope in Hawaii detected an object close to the earth, named Kamo’oalewa (or 469219 Kamo’oalewa), measuring between 131 and 328 feet (40 to 100 meters) wide.
Although it orbits the sun along the earth, subsequent research has shown that it probably came from the moon, possibly ejected during the impact that created the Giordano Bruno crater 1 to 10 million years ago.
More recently, astronomers reported another Temporer Earth satellite, 2024 PT5, which was discovered last year. Its composition seems to look like the moon more than an asteroid, supporting more the idea that certain minimons can be fragments of lunar material.
