Volcano or Not?

Ever since Soviet Astronomer Nikolai A. Kozyrev reported that he had seen a volcano-like eruption on the moon early in November, non-Russian astronomers have been waiting to see his evidence. Last week they got it: a long, detailed report in Sky and Telescope, published at Harvard College Observatory.

Dr. Kozyrev tells how he trained a 50-in. telescope on the moon on the night of Nov. 2-3 and took spectrograms of the crater Alphonsus. While he was watching, he saw the small, central peak of the crater lose its sharpness and turn reddish. By the time he changed the plate to take the next spectrogram, the peak was white again but much brighter than usual. A third spectrogram showed the crater back to normal.

Dr. Kozyrev shows a spectrogram with an unusual bright streak, and explains what he thinks happened. The reddish patch over the crater's central peak he believes was caused by volcanic ash shot out of the moon's crust. The dust settled quickly, since there is no air to keep it up.

But a stream of gas followed the ash and spread into the vacuum above the moon's surface. The gas contained carbon molecules of various sorts, and ultraviolet light from the sun made them glow brilliantly, accounting for the bright streak on the spectrogram.

If there was a volcanic eruption, it is evidence that the moon is not a cold, dead lump of rock, but that its interior is still hot, at least in some places. Some non-Russian astronomers have accepted Dr. Kozyrev's observations, if not his theories. Professor Donald H. Menzel of Harvard thinks that Kozyrev certainly saw something happen on the moon, but it may have been merely a jet of gas breaking out of a crevice. Physicist J. H. Fremlin of the University of Birmingham, England theorized in this week's Nature that if the bottoms of lunar craters are deeply covered with dust, as many astronomers think, they are likely places for gas eruptions. The dust layer, says Fremlin, would be a good heat insulator. It would trap under the crater's floor the heat generated by radioactivity in the moon's rock. Many times in a million years the rock might get hot enough to spew out some gas.

There is also an anti-volcano faction. One eminent American astronomer, who does not want to commit himself publicly until he has digested still more evidence, is highly skeptical. He has examined Alphonsus and has seen no slightest change. He has heard that some Soviet astronomers have their doubts about Kozyrev. They suggest that "he thinks that it is his destiny to make a great discovery." When Kozyrev made the spectrograms, he did not mention them to his colleagues at the Crimean Observatory. Instead, he rushed off to Moscow and a week later held a press conference to announce his lunar volcano. This is considered odd scientific manners, even in Russia.

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