A recent study showed that the moon’s surface has shrunk over the last billion years or so, though the change is not noticeable just from staring at it.

Dr. Thomas R. Watters, who is from the Smithsonian’s National Air and Space Museum’s Center for Earth and Planetary Studies, said, “The kind of radius change and shrinking we’re describing here is small that you would never notice it.”

Watters and his colleague were able to discover several faults and cracks on the moon’s surface via NASA’s Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter. These faults cause one fracture to slide on top of another, forming ridges. They found 14 landforms which they called lobate scarps. Apparently, all planetary bodies experience the same cooling and shrinking process.

“One of the really cool parts of this … the faults are so young-looking that you can’t escape the possibility that this contraction occurred recently, and could indicate that the moon is still active,” Watters explained.

There is no need to worry too much about this because the moon is not going to melt or disappear and its shrinking will not have any negative effects to Earth, Watters stressed.

The findings of this study can be found in the Friday edition of Science.

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