article_snippet.sent: The object could have been responsible for creating the moon.
article_snippet.sent: Our current theory of the young Earth’s formation involves basically more and more asteroids and other objects accumulating into one body.
article_snippet.sent: This likely would have happened about 4.5 billion years ago.
article_snippet.sent: Many researchers believe the moon formed after the young Earth was hit by a planet the size of Mars billions of years ago.
article_snippet.sent: This is called the giant impact hypothesis.
article_snippet.sent: the giant impact hypothesis claims the moon formed after Earth is debris left over following an indirect collision between our planet and an astronomical body approximately 4.5 billion years ago.
article_snippet.sent: an astronomical body approximately 4.5 billion years ago is sometimes called Theia, after the mythical Greek Titan who was the mother of Selene, the goddess of the moon formed after Earth.
article_snippet.sent: But one mystery has persisted, revealed by rocks the Apollo astronauts brought back from the moon formed after Earth - why are the moon and the young Earth so similar in their composition?
article_snippet.sent: Several different theories have emerged over the years to explain the similar fingerprints of the young Earth and the moon formed after Earth.
article_snippet.sent: Perhaps the impact created a huge cloud of debris that mixed thoroughly with the young Earth the young Earth and then later condensed to form the moon formed after Earth.
article_snippet.sent: Or Theia could have, coincidentally, been isotopically similar to the young Earththe young Earth.
article_snippet.sent: A third possibility is that the moon formed from Earthen materials, rather than from Theia, although this would have been a very unusual type of impact.
article_snippet.sent: Our current theory of the young Earth’s (left) formation involves basically more and more asteroids and other objects accumulating into one body.
article_snippet.sent: In the young solar system 4.5 billion years ago, illustrated, various planetesimals and other small bodies coalesced together to form larger bodies like the young Earth .
article_snippet.sent: And they do not rule out the possibility that this is the same Mars-sized body that formed the moon.
article_snippet.sent: It's kind of exciting to think that this reduced body could actually be the thing which caused the moon.
highlights_snippet.sent: The Mars-sized object could have been responsible for creating the moon .
  