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LETTER OF THE MONTH

Don’t inhale In your story headlined ‘Scientists plan to melt Moon dust to lay lunar roads’ (November, p16), you mention how damaging the dust on the Moon can be – how it eroded the spacesuits worn by the Apollo astronauts and the hazard it might present for future lunar missions. Did the Apollo astronauts suffer any long-term health effects from exposure to the dust they brought back into the lunar module on their suits and boots?

Alan Thomas, Middlesex

Editor Daniel Bennett replies All the Apollo astronauts that walked on the Moon suffered sore throats, itchy eyes and sneezing in the days after taking their small steps and giant leaps for mankind – symptoms that were christened ‘lunar hay fever’. As for long-term effects, I’m not aware of any that have been reported. Although a study published in 2018 showed that lunar soil simulants can destroy lung and brain tissue after long-term exposure.

WRITE IN AND WIN!

The writer of next issue’s Letter of the Monthwins a

pair of hardback popular science books. Put pen to paper (or fingertips to keyboard) and you could get your hands on The Warped Side of Our Universeby Kip Thorne and Lia Halloran, and On the Origin of Time by Thomas Hertog.

YOUR FACTS OF THE MONTH

We asked you to send in your favourite recently discovered science facts – and you didn’t disappoint…

The majority of our oxygen comes from oceans! Plankton, algae, seaweed and some bacteria photosynthesise and produce roughly half the world’s supply.

Brendan Falvey (@BrendanFalvey)

Dark energy could eventually make the Universe so large that all of the galaxies in the night sky will have accelerated beyond our horizon – we won’t really be able to see them. And, because our knowledge of the Big Bang comes from these galaxies, future scientists could be left in the dark.

Ahmed Nour (@nourishintheory)

There are more stars in the observable Universe (probably at least 10²², or 10 followed by 22 zeros) than there are grains of sand on all of the beaches on Earth! Also,