NASA Reveals the Dark Side of the Moon
Because the moon is tidally locked to Earth, there is one side of the lunar surface we never see; what was once known as the "dark side of the moon." NASA has revealed the far side of the moon in a video which takes a look at the moon from the perspective of its far side.
NASA's Scientific Visualization Studio has taken nearly five-years of mapping data from the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter to create a stunning animation video. The Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter, a robotic mission that set out to map the moon's surface, was launched in 2009 from Florida. Since then it has beamed back hundreds of terabytes of data, giving scientists the ability to develop the images.
"It lacks the large dark spots, called maria, that make up the familiar Man in the Moon on the near side," a NASA spokesperson said. "Instead, craters of all sizes crowd together over the entire far side. The far side is also home to one of the largest and oldest impact features in the solar system, the South Pole-Aitken basin."