Scientists say they have discovered water trapped inside tiny beads of glass scattered across the moon, suggesting a potential reservoir of this precious resource for future human activities on the lunar surface.

The moon was long believed to be dry, but over the last few decades, several missions have shown there is water both on the surface and trapped inside minerals.

Scientists said on Monday that an analysis of lunar soil samples retrieved in 2020 during China’s robotic Chang’ e-5 mission showed that these spheres of glass – rock melted and cooled – bore within them water molecules formed through the action of the solar wind on the moon’s surface.

“The moon is constantly bombarded with impactors – for example micrometeoroids and large meteoroids – which produce impact glass beads during high-energy flash-heating events,” said planetary scientist Sen Hu of the Chinese Academy of Sciences’ Institute of Geology and Geophysics, a co-author of the study published in the journal Nature Geoscience.

(Aljazeera)

Aljazeera reported that Three children and three adults have been killed after a woman opened fire at a primary school in Nashville, Tennessee, local officials said, in the latest instance of deadly gun violence in the United States.

The shooting happened on Monday morning at The Covenant School, a private Presbyterian school with a student body of about 200 that teaches preschool through sixth grade.

The three children, all nine years old, had gunshot wounds, officials said, and they were pronounced dead upon arrival at the Monroe Carell Jr Children’s Hospital at Vanderbilt. The adult victims were all over 60, according to authorities. Their roles at the school were not immediately clear.

The Metropolitan Nashville Police Department said on Monday afternoon that the suspect, a 28-year-old Nashville resident they identified as Audrey Hale, had been fatally shot by officers after they entered the building.

Weather forecast issued at 05.30 a.m. on 28 March 2023 by the Department of Meteorology

Showers or thundershowers may occur at a few places in Western, Sabaragamuwa, Uva and North-western provinces and in Kandy, Nuwara-Eliya, Galle, Matara and Mannar districts during the afternoon or night.

Winds will be north-easterly or variable in direction and wind speed will be (20-30) kmph.

General public is kindly requested to take adequate precautions to minimize damages caused by temporary localized strong winds and lightning during thundershowers.