Discussant about geoscience and how lunar samples from the Apollo Mission help scientists understand our moon and solar system. The National Archives and American Geophysical union cohosted this event. [captions Copyright National cable satellite corp. 2019] i am thevening, archivist of the united states. Its a pleasure to welcome you to the william g mcallen theatre, whether you are here in the room with us, or participating through facebook or youtube, and a special welcome to our cspan audience. If you could please join us for tonights program, small steps 11 giant leaps, how apollo shaped our understanding of earth and beyond. Tonights program is presented in partnership with the american episcopal union, celebrating its geophysicalrsary union, celebrating its 100th anniversary, and the generous support of the boeing company. Days, we arefour commemorating the 50th anniversary of the historic flight of apollo 11 and the first moon landing. We will night, july 18, screen a celebrated documentary, apollo 11, grafted from newly discovered video and audio recorded here at the National Archives. Film, a discussion will be moderated with the and others. On july 19, we will show two films in the afternoon at noon. We will have episode six from the earth to the moon, and we will show moon walk one, a 1970s nasa documentary. And we will screen the 2018 feature film, first man, starring ryan gosling is Neil Armstrong. Upstairs, be sure to see our special display of document that shows a multitude of smaller steps and details necessary to the success of the apollo 11 mission. Profilerds include the of the eight days of the mission, the plan for the hour that the lunar module landed on the moon, pages of moon landing transcripts and the details of the itinerary the astronauts were to follow during the moonwalk. Those documents will be on display through august 7. To keep informed about these events throughout the year, you can alsosite, sign up to get email updates and find information about other National Archives programs and activities. Another way to get more involved is to become a member of the National Archives foundation, which supports all of our education and outreach activities. Now it is my pleasure to turn the program over to christine, the executive director of the American Geophysical union. Its a Worldwide Scientific Community that advances the understanding of earth and space through cooperation in research. Shes the third executive director in their 100 year history. For over 25 years, shes made her mark as a leader and innovator. In 2011 she was chosen for women mentoring leaders, and was featured as one of the top 100 Women Leaders in stem. Please welcome christine maca t mac and teen m christine. And ourhalf of agu hundred thousand scientists that reside in 130 come to countries around the world, welcome to tonights special , how apollo 11 shaped our understanding of earth and beyond. And space earth scientists and their collaborators so they can advance and communicate science and its power to ensure a sustainable future. We are proud to cope present this event this year and are sent to neil year as an organization. Agu was when a gu founded, the world was a different place. Despite a centurys worth of change, the ability of earth and Space Science to improve our society, and the desire scientists to provide that benefit to humanity has remained the same. Has has the odd discovery that all of us witnessed, as i did as a 14yearold girl in a small town in western pennsylvania, to watch the Lunar Landing on blackandwhite tv. Earlier in the year i was stilliewing dr. Drew five , who commanded an expedition to the International Space station. During our conversation he spoke about the residence of the apollo the residents about the apollo 11 mission for him personally and for humanity and drove home the point that the lion share the Research Done was geoscience, including the collection of lunar samples, the deployment of scientific instruments, and the collection of core samples on the lunar surface. Geoscience will continue to play a similar role in the future of lunar and other planetary missions. He also spoke about how over the course of his 197 days in space on his latest mission, he saw the changes that the earth was having in its climate, how floods affect the planet and other geophysical phenomena are impacting the surface. He also experience what astronauts have dubbed the overview effect, when viewing the earth from space, many astronauts see the fragility of our global environment, and how we are all protected and nourished by our planets thin atmosphere. Boundaries between nations disappear and the issues of separate people are viewed as less important. What becomes clear is the need to create a more unified global society, one that works to protect all of the inhabitants of this Pale Blue Dot we call our home. During times of uncertainty and change to earths climate and the scientific enterprise, all of us, particularly the Scientific Community, must join together to address these concerns. Like all of us, and those who are part of witnessing more being on the apollo 11 mission, we had to be creative and passionate, committed, and determined. We must advance research, and do so with the integrity and transparency that is the foundation of scientific discovery. I am now proud to introduce the agu, a member of 30 years and became president elect in 2017, shes the past president of our cryospheres section. She received her undergraduate degree in geology from middle berry college, in vermont, and her phd in geophysics from columbia. Since completing her doctorate, she has led research at the Lamont Doherty earth observatory on ice sheets, tectonics, rivers, and made ocean ridges. Please join me in welcoming her. [laughter] [applause] im very excited. Anyone who has ever come within 10 feet of me realizes im an actual geek. And when i realized we were going to have this wonderful event, first i thought i could mark whereas i wish were you when apollo 11 landed . Everyone in my community was becausento the room there was only one tv in the community and we had about 45 people jammed into the room. But i thought i should look a little deeper than just the consider myhat i living legacy. So i began to poke around at my institution, because it turns do that lamont had a lot to and i knew there was a gravity meter i had been tripping over my entire life. I went looking for it. I went first to the attic of lamont hall, where they match the bottom of the ocean floor. It was not there. 11 slides and pictures but no gravity meter. Mention, noe gravity meter, and i went to the of the cellar building, there were jars of jellyfish and i knew they were not from the moon. I finally opened the door and there it was, there was the mock gravity meter that went on the back of the vehicle. That is out on the table if you want to see it. I brought it down on amtrak. I think it is the first time the gravity meter has had a trip on amtrak. Someone on my committee conveyed these very important lessons in science. You dont give up. Tried, something happened. So it was apollo 13. Apollo 14, the drill got stuck and they only got one measurement. Apollo 16 is the first time an apology from the astronauts back to the scientists because something bad happened. In his obituary, it says a misstep. They tripped over it and pulled the wire. But marcus stuck with it. Apollo 17, the astronauts are on the moon and joking about how not to trip over it. T i took away from his lesson was to not give up, be patient, and you can get what you want. I took colleagues down to the ellar and we found the heat flow instrument. Wonderful to learn the stories of the measurements they made, of how the philosophy of moon rocks is not that different. It shows scientists can be very patient, recover from disasters, and have the sense of humor a sense of humor. I hope you will enjoy the program as much as i am looking forward to tonight. We will learn a lot. There are some amazing people we will learn from. Agu, role as president of i realize now having watched the eyes of my cohorts when i went cellar entrepreneur to just how inspiring this work generation. Xt just being able to hear the stories and here where their parents were when the moon landing happened, it actually lights up their eyes and gets people inspired to work on science on this planet and on other planets. So now, im very pleased to introduce dr. Jim green, who is nasas chief scientist. He received his phd in space physics from the university of iowa and worked at Nasas Marshall Space Flight Center where he developed and managed the space physics analysis network. Before becoming nasas chief scientist, he was the director of the Planetary Science at nasa headquarters where he saw missions, including the new horizons flyby of pluto, that youflight to jupiter the juno flight to jupiter, and the landing of the curiosity rover on mars. We are very lucky to have him as a moderator of this panel tonight. Please join me in welcoming dr. Jim green. [applause] green im glad the rain could not stop you from coming tonight. Discovering about many more things about the moon and the origin and evolution of the solar system. It is going to be a really exciting time for we will also talk about the future of Lunar Exploration truth without further ado, i want to mention a couple of important things. Cards. E should have these are important because you can write questions down. Please write your questions as they come up. I find that is usually the best way to go. Hang on to them. And at the end, we will pass them down and go through as many as we can. In addition to the audience that is here, we also have remote viewers. For them, let me read on twitter what hashtag they should send questions to. Agu100. And for those online, please get ready with your questions. We will try to get to as many of them as possible. Tonight, we will have a moderated panel. I am delighted to have been asked to moderate the panel. We have some of the best planetary scientists in the world, those that have worked with even apollo 11 data all the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter that is they are now. Without further ado, let me begin introductions. First, i would like to invite the assistant professor of geophysics at Stanford University on to the stage. [applause] dr. Green next is dr. Sean solomon, director of the observatory. [applause] dr. Green we also have heather postdoc fellow at the lunar and Planetary Institute in houston, texas. Heather. [applause] dr. Green and last but not chair the professor and of the earth, environmental, and Planetary Sciences at case western reserve university. [applause] dr. Green we are going to start out by talking about the legacy of apollo, what it meant to the country going back now 50 years. We will go back in the way back machine. On this panel, two people observed the landing. That was shone as a working scientist and as a Young High School student, jim green here. Fond memories. Im going to ask sean to take us back to the Lunar Landing. What was the feeling of the Science Community at that time . What were they excited about . I hope some of you will remember the apollo 11 landing. I was a graduate student in geophysics at m. I. T. , and the world had been following the Apollo Program and the leadup to it. We had the anniversary of the launch of apollo yesterday, apollo 11. This saturday, we will have the anniversary of the landing. 1969,vening, july 20, Late Afternoon was the landing. I would say there were probably billions of people around the world watching that event all over the globe. Together toumanity look at a technological achievement in a largely apolitical way. Less than eight years after president kennedy announced in his speech in houston in early 1961 challenging the country to go to the moon before the end of the decade, to send humans to the moon and bring them back safely. We did that. 1961 was such an early phase of the space program. The first humans had orbited the planet. It was only four years after sputnik. Yet in eight years, we could carry a apollo 11. Really extraordinary. The backing of the country, it had resources, and really amazing engineers who figured out very challenging problems. One of the things the Scientific Community realized is they were witnessing a remarkable event in history and a remarkable achievement. Scientifically, the apollo 11 mission was enormously important ourur perspective of how planet fits into the solar system and what the early history of the solar system was like. I cannot understate the importance of the apollo 11 mission in particular for bringing back lunar rocks and samples into the best earth with many of the instruments having been purchased by nasa specifically for the Apollo Program and were ready to look at lunar samples. The moon is very agent. We immediately learned it was volcanic. Themmediately learned that bright areas of the moon were a product of an early stage in lunar history when the entire planet was molten and the crust formed as a result of the cooling of the magma ocean. All of that came from the apollo 11 mission. It led to an explosion of understanding of the early ,istory of the planetary system the part of the system of our planet not preserved in the rock record. I am not sure i realized all of that as a graduate student sitting in front of the television and listening to walter cronkite, but that is what happened. Did not take it long before the Scientific Community realized what a watershed event it was. Dr. Green we are celebrating the 50th anniversary. I think a lot of the general public think of it as human explanation, but science was there from the beginning. When i watched it, one of the startling things i saw was when Neil Armstrong walked out of the capsule, he looked around and saw how the lunar limb was sitting on the surface and how deep the legs might have been crushing into it. There were some debates on how thick that might be. Was right off the bat talking science. That was pretty spectacular. What did we put down on the moon for apollo 11 . Apollo 11 was the first of the landed spacecraft. There were a total of six that landed successfully. It was not the most ambitious by far in the experience experiments it brought to the surface. But one of the opportunities provided by the Apollo Missions was the opportunity to do seismology, to study natural tectonic events and the impacts of meteoroids on the surface of the moon using seismometers. Analogous to what terrestrial jews of geophysicists had of a centuryr 3 4 studying earthquakes around the world and using the waves to learn about the interior structure of the earth. Institution, my current institution, and a few others, got together and sent a seismic system on apollo, including apollo 11. For reasons of cost, for reasons of schedule, the very first passive seismic experiment carried by apollo 11 did not have a power source so it only lasted three weeks. That theed signals best seismologists in the world could not understand. So for three weeks, there were seismic signals being recorded by the seismic system on the lunar surface. Then the power ran out and the signal stopped. Really distinguished who had been working on lunar seismology and thinking about it for years prior to the mission did not know what they had in the way of the signal. Shown on the screen is a nation an explanation. The top four are the lunar seismic graham and the bottom is the earth seismic graham. They thought they would see signals like you see on earth. They saw signals that were very different. They did not have distinct arriving phases and rang on for an hour. It was said that the moon rang like a bell. Signals, nobody figured out what they were. It took apollo 12. 12 difference was the apollo landed in a different place. It had a power source. Then they left the moon again. Asked nasaogists had for permission when the astronauts docked with the command module in lunar orbit the vehicleneed anymore to send the ascent vehicle back down to the moon where it would crash and create seismic waves. It would crash in a no place at a known time. So for the first time, they had a seismic source the characteristics of which they seismogramsproduced like the ones that came in on apollo 11. Moment, this is what seismograms look like on the moon. It took another experiment. It took the cooperation of the flight folks at nasa to recreate and event so we could understand how different the moon is from the earth. It is different for a variety of technical reasons. Because theent outer tens of kilometers are fractured and broken up trade and the moon is extraordinarily so the waves go on for hours instead of minutes. None of that was known before the Apollo Mission. If you take a terrestrial experiment to a new planetary body, you really have to think outofthebox sometimes to interpret what you find. Dr. Green indeed. These are fabulous sets of data. If you are really excited about these, please see me after the lecture. Variety ofollected a samples and did a fabulous job. Back to have about 50 pounds worth of samples the apollo 11 crew brought back. Why do we need those samples . What can we learn from those . The apollo samples are not just a bunch of souvenirs, even though they are really cool. But they represent this incredible treasure trove of knowledge about processes occurring in the early solar system. Not just how the earth and moon formed, but also the incredible bombardment of giant impacts occurring in the first billion years or so after the solar system was initially formed. What is great about getting whole rock samples from the moon on these missions