---
title: "The Moon Could Have Formed in Just 5 Hours: Scientists Change Their View on Earth's Satellite Origin"
description: "A new study showed that the Moon could have formed in just 5 hours after Earth collided with Theia if the impacting bodies were cold and strong."
date: 2026-10-09T05:14:01.000Z
lang: en
url: https://xab.info/en/posts/moon-could-form-in-5-hours-scientists
tags: [moon, astronomy, space, earth, science]
publisher: "XAB.info"
---

# The Moon Could Have Formed in Just 5 Hours: Scientists Change Their View on Earth's Satellite Origin

![Young Earth and collision with Theia during the Moon's formation](https://xab.info/media/2026/10/09/luna-mogla-obrazovatsya-za-5-chasov-uchenye/luna-mogla-obrazovatsya-za-5-chasov-uchenye-1.webp)

## 🎯 Key Points

- The Moon could have formed in just 5 hours thanks to a new simulation.
- Scientists factored in the mechanical strength of rocks and body temperatures.
- The isotopic paradox of lunar and Earth soil similarity remains open.

The Moon may have formed much faster than previously thought, as a new evolutionary simulation has proposed a radically different scenario for the birth of our natural satellite. For decades, the scientific community was dominated by the theory that the Moon emerged as a result of a long and gradual accretion process of space debris. According to this classical hypothesis, about 4.5 billion years ago, the young Earth collided with a Mars-sized planetary embryo named Theia after the mythological mother of the Moon goddess Selene. As a result of the colossal impact, a vast amount of fragments from both celestial bodies was ejected into near-Earth orbit, where they slowly coalesced under gravity over millennia.

### New Digital Simulations and the Role of Materials

 A new study published in the prestigious journal The Astrophysical Journal Letters offers a completely different perspective on these dramatic events in the early Solar System. Using advanced digital simulations, an international team of researchers modeled a head-on collision between the young Earth and a Mars-sized object, accounting for the mechanical strength of rocks for the very first time. It turned out that the physical state of the materials—their initial temperature and degree of plasticity—plays a decisive role in shaping the final outcome. During the experiments, scientists varied the initial temperature parameters of Earth and Theia within 400, 800, and 2000 kelvins, revealing new physical regularities of the process.### The Rapid Satellite Birth Scenario

 If the colliding bodies were initially hot and malleable, the impact would eject a massive amount of material outward, triggering the classical scenario of satellite formation from a slowly gathering orbital disk. However, under conditions where the objects remained cold and mechanically strong, Theia could have partially survived the catastrophic collision as an intact monolithic chunk and almost instantly established itself in a stable orbit. In some of the most successful simulation configurations, a fully formed and ready Moon emerged just five hours after impact. Although this model is not yet final proof, it convincingly demonstrates the physical plausibility of such a rapid process, which scientists previously dismissed due to oversimplified approaches to rock properties.### Contradictory Data

Despite the revolutionary nature of these new conclusions, a serious paradox persists in modern science regarding the isotopic composition of lunar rocks. Soil samples brought back to Earth by legendary Apollo missions demonstrate a striking similarity to terrestrial minerals in their isotopic composition. This creates significant difficulties for theorists, as conventional astronomical calculations assume Theia formed in a completely different region of the protoplanetary disk. The new computer simulation does not yet provide an exhaustive answer to this question, but it leaves open the hypothesis that Earth and Theia could have originally formed in the same region of the Solar System from very similar cosmic elements.

## 🔍 Fact-Check Verification

- [Луна могла образоваться всего за 5 часов: ученые изменили мнение о происхождении спутника Земли](https://www.rbc.ua/ukr/news/misyats-mig-utvoritisya-lishe-5-godin-chomu-1791471238.html) - Данные совпадают с исходным текстом симуляции.
- [Луна могла "родиться" за несколько часов: ученые ошарашили открытием](https://www.unian.net/science/luna-mogla-poyavitsya-za-neskolko-chasov-posle-katastroficheskogo-stolknoveniya-13510797.html) - Подтверждена гипотеза быстрого формирования.
- [Луна могла образоваться всего за пять часов, заявили ученые](https://mir24.tv/news/16683984/luna-mogla-obrazovatsya-vsego-za-pyat-chasov-zayavili-uchenye) - Подтверждены детали физического моделирования.
- [Луна могла сформироваться всего за 5 часов: ученые раскрыли неизвестные ранее детали ее появления](https://fedpress.ru/news/77/society/3450162) - Подтверждены параметры температуры и прочности пород.

## ❓ FAQ

### Q: How long did it take for the Moon to form according to the new version?
**A:** According to computer modeling results, a fully formed Moon could have emerged just 5 hours after the collision.

### Q: What was the name of the planetary embryo that collided with Earth?
**A:** The Mars-sized planetary embryo was named Theia after the mother of the Moon goddess Selene.