Washington, Dec 7 : The surface of moon is constantly being eroded by solar storms and associated Coronal Mass Ejections (CMEs), which is not only stripping generous amount of material but may also cause a major atmospheric loss for planets like Mars that are unprotected by a global magnetic field, a new study has suggested.

CMEs are basically an intense gust of the normal solar wind, a diffuse stream of electrically conductive gas called plasma that's blown outward from the surface of the Sun into space.

According to the research, being led by Rosemary Killen at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, a strong CME may contain around a billion tons of plasma moving at up to a million miles per hour in a cloud many times the size of Earth.

The moon has just the barest wisp of an atmosphere, technically called an exosphere because it is so tenuous, which leaves it vulnerable to CME effects. The plasma from CMEs impacts the lunar surface, and atoms from the surface are ejected in a process called `sputtering'.

"We found that when this massive cloud of plasma strikes the moon, it acts like a sandblaster and easily removes volatile material from the surface," said William Farrell, DREAM team lead at NASA Goddard.

"The model predicts 100 to 200 tons of lunar material - the equivalent of 10 dump truck loads - could be stripped off the lunar surface during the typical 2-day passage of a CME."

This is the first time researchers have attempted to predict the effects of a CME on the moon.

"Sputtering is among the top five processes that create the moon''s exosphere under normal solar conditions, but our model predicts that during a CME, it becomes the dominant method by far, with up to 50 times the yield of the other methods," said Killen.

The team used data from satellite observations that revealed this enrichment as input to their model.

Space scientists have long been aware that these solar storms dramatically affect the Earth's magnetic field and are responsible for intense aurora (Northern and Southern Lights).

While certain areas of the Martian surface are magnetized, Mars does not have a magnetic field that surrounds the entire planet. Therefore, CME gases have a direct path to sputter and erode that planet's upper atmosphere.

The study has been published in the Journal of Geophysical Research Planets. (ANI)