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Salient: Victoria University Students' Newspaper. Vol. 24, No. 7. 1961.

Lunar Organic Chemistry

Lunar Organic Chemistry

Although it is highly unlikely that there is life on the moon, the nearest target of space explorers probably does contain a layer of organic molecules, formed in its early atmosphere and now buried in dust roughly 10 metres deep, according to calculations by Carl Sagan of the Yerkes Observatory. Contamination of this material with micro-organisms or organic matter carried by rockets, he writes in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Science, "would represent an unparalleled scientific disaster."

The author suggests that the early moon, like the early earth, probably had an atmosphere of methane, ammonia and water-vapour. This composition may have persisted for 10 to 100 million years, nourished by gas leaking out from the Interior. Thus there would have been ample time for ultraviolet light and electrical discharges to convert some of the mixture to organic molecules, Including amino acids. Sagan calculates that enough of this material fell to the lunar surface to make up a layer as dense as 10 grams per square centimetre.