NASA spacecraft makes major discovery in 'permanent darkness'

New data collected by NASA spacecraft could help the space agency get closer to establishing its first off-Earth base.

According to Sci-News , NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) has found ice deposits larger than scientists ever imagined in the "permanent shadow" around the Moon's South Pole.

Images captured by NASA spacecraft show many areas of permanent darkness marked in blue - (Photo: NASA)

Permanent shadow regions (PSRs) often appear in topographic depressions near the Moon's poles, where sunlight can never reach.

So they've been cold for billions of years, and that's what's helped preserve more ice molecules than we thought, accumulating into large deposits.

Dr Timothy McClanahan, a researcher from NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, said their model and analysis showed the largest ice concentrations are expected to appear near the coldest locations of the PSR, where temperatures drop to -198 degrees Celsius.

It is the dark slopes that slope down towards the South Pole.

They could not determine the exact volume of the PSR ice deposits or determine whether they were buried under dry rock, but calculated that up to 5 liters of ice were contained in every 1 cubic meter of near-surface sediment.

This is just the initial discovery.

NASA's LRO spacecraft carries the Lunar Exploration Neutron Detector (LEND), an instrument that helped scientists identify these ice deposits and will continue to help them learn more about the properties of what lurks beneath the surface in the shadow regions.

The identification of large ice deposits is good news for NASA as well as many other space agencies around the world.

Many space agencies have long dreamed of establishing the first extraterrestrial base on the Moon, where local water — from ice deposits — would serve as both a source of life and fuel for spacecraft and other equipment.