“From the earth, moon looks white in colour, what would be the colour of the moon rock then?” a student checked with his friend while waiting impatiently to see the piece. The moon rock exhibition put up by the National Institute of Technology, Tiruchi, over the weekend at Mahatma School evoked curiosity among the students.
On display was a sample of the original. “It weighs 120 gm and is a fragment of the eight kg specimen NASA brought from the moon,” informs T. Athip, one of the three student coordinators of Pragyan, an international techno-management event of NIT.
It was not easy to borrow the piece of rock from NASA, which set conditions for the exhibit including a proximity sensor, safety vault, armed guard protection and CCTV surveillance.Only after submitting our elaborate security plan and ensuring the safety of the rock sample NASA agreed to loan it to us through our alumnus. It was brought from Houston, Texas,” says Rithvik, another Pragyan coordinator.
The sample is preserved in a prism made of Lucite material (glass like object that is durable and shatter resistant).
“The rock is composed of mare basalt. Basalt is the common igneous rock, while mare in Greek means sea. Scientists initially thought that the dark spots on the moon’s surface were seas. The Apollo 17 landed on one of the dark spots and picked the sample,” informs his friend Sameer.
As the moon rock is more than 3.75 billion years old and exposed only to solar radiation, scientists are studying the behaviour of sun through the specimen. “It assumes importance because by studying the rock scientists can prove or disprove a lot of theories about our universe,” says Athip.
The NASA moon rock exhibit is part of the annual Pragyan exhibition programme where several technologically innovative exhibits from all over the country are put on display. Some of the exhibits include, humanoid robots, sophisticated ammunitions used by the Indian Army, Arjun tank, brain controlled helicopter, cockpit of a supersonic jet by Aeronautical Development Agency, indigenously developed high-energy gas turbines and batteries.
Since the main objective of the exhibition is to ignite scientific temper among students, Pragyan is now travelling with it to different cities.
Videos of Apollo missions and the experiments conducted at NASA facilities are also screened at the venue.
“Considering the usefulness of the programme, we invited lot of schools to see the moon rock. Unfortunately only a few responded,” says Premalatha Panneerselvam, senior principal, Mahatma schools.
