China Claims It's Discovered a New Mineral in Its 2020 Samples from the Moon

China is claiming it discovered a new lunar mineral in moon samples it retrieved in 2020. From the South China Morning Post:

The mineral, called Changesite-(Y), was found in rock and dust samples retrieved from the moon by China's Chang'e-5 mission, the nation's first mission to return a lunar sample, which launched in 2020.

A research team from the Beijing Research Institute of Uranium Geology, a subsidiary of the China National Nuclear Corporation (CNNC), isolated a single crystalline particle of the material from more than 140,000 lunar particles using hi-tech processes, including X-ray diffraction, according to Wang Xuejun, a party official with the CNNC. The particle was about 10 microns in diameter, or about one-tenth of a human hair, Wang told a press conference on Friday....

Meanwhile, Wang added that the research team had for the first time measured the concentration of a future fusion energy source, in the lunar sample. "It provides fundamental scientific data for future assessment of helium-3 in lunar samples and their exploration," Wang said.

If confirmed, it would provide "more basic scientific data for the evaluation and development of lunar resources," according to an executive with the China Atomic Energy Authority, while also deepening mankind's knowledge of the solar system. (It would be the sixth new mineral discovered on the moon.)

Speaking at a press conference, he told the audience that China "has also become the third country to retrieve lunar samples and discover new lunar minerals after the U.S. and Russia." The article points out that China hopes to land another sample-collecting probe to the moon "around 2024," and that a senior lunar program designer said China "could" land astronauts on the moon by 2030.

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