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What's Actually Under The Moon's Surface, According To NASA
By ELI SHAYOTOVICH
Like Earth, the Moon also has a crust, mantle, and core — however, its center is made of iron and nickel, making it the solar system's second densest moon behind Io, one of the 79 moons circling Jupiter. The solid inner core of the Moon is 480 kilometers in diameter, and the outer core of molten liquid iron pushes the total diameter to 660 kilometers.
The Moon's lithosphere comprises most of its interior at roughly 620 miles thick. The mantle is about 839 miles wide, while the crust is only 31 miles, and oddly, the Moon's side facing towards Earth has a thinner crust than the one facing away — but according to NASA, scientists aren't sure why.
While the first few hundred meters below the Moon's silvery surface might be devoid of any precious metals, the deeper one goes, the richer the treasure. NASA's Gravity Recovery and Interior Laboratory (GRAIL) mission has discovered a mass of metal "five times larger than the Big Island of Hawaii" under the South Pole-Aitken Basin.