Chinese scientists have discovered that the mantle on the far side of the moon is cooler than that on the near side, after analyzing the lunar farside soil samples collected by China's Chang'e-6 lunar probe.

This discovery provides the petrological and geochemical evidence for a temperature contrast between the lunar nearside and farside mantles, supplying the critical dataset needed to elucidate the moon's evolution.

The study was conducted by the Beijing Research Institute of Uranium Geology, Peking University and Shandong University, and published in the journal Nature Geoscience.