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>>Interviewer: Well the full moon on August 10th isn't like other full moons we've seen this

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year. This is a "supermoon," and here to tell us more about it

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is NASA scientist Dr. Noah Petro. Thank you for joining us, Noah. 

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>>Noah: Well thank you for having me. >>Interviewer: So what is a "supermoon" and what makes 

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this full moon special? >>Noah: So the supermoon is the closest

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largest full moon of the calendar year. It's a real treat to see the Moon 

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in a unique way. Because the Moon's orbit around the Earth is not a perfect

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circle, it gets farther away of the course of the year, when it's farthest away it's known as

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"apogee," and when it's closest it's known as "perigee," so over the weekend we're going to have a perigee

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full moon, the closest full moon of the year. Because it's close, it's going to appear about

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14% larger, about 30% brighter than the 

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smallest full moon of the year. So ti's going to be larger and brighter than your average full moon. 

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So it should be a really great show. >>Interviewer: When is the best time to view the

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supermoon, and will it look different from other full moons? >>Noah: The best time to see

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the supermoon is any time at night, go out and look at the sky. The supermoon will be up after

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sunset. Watch it when it rises to the east, and

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you should have a great view of a beautiful full moon in the sky. 

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>>Interviewer: NASA has had a spacecraft orbiting the Moon for five 

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years called the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter. What are some of the cool

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things we're learning from this mission? >>Noah: Yes, so LRO has been at the Moon

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for five years, and in that time we've completely re-written our understanding of the lunar surface.

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We have produced the highest resolution of topographic

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map of any planetary body in the solar system, including the Earth,

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we've had higher resolution images and data products to tell us about impact craters change

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the surface. And we get these wonderful vistas, these wonderful views of the lunar surface

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including the beautiful central peak of the Tycho Crater and that beautiful boulder

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perched on top. >>Narrator: What has the origin of the Moon

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taught us about our solar system? >>Noah: One of the things that we've learned

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about the early history of the Moon and it's early development 

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is that it was a very violent time. There were lots of large impact craters 

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forming very rapidly in the earliest history of the Moon about 4 and a half billion years ago. 

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Because the Moon is so close to the Earth, we know that those same events 

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must have been happening also on the Earth. So we're learning about the early history of all 

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planetary bodies in the solar system by studying the earliest history of the Moon. 

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It's a really wonderful opportunity to learn about fundamental processes across the solar

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system. >>Interviewer: Well it's been 45 years

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since NASA put a man on the Moon. So what have learned about our closest neighbor 

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since then? >>Noah: Well the wonderful thing in the 45 years since

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the Apollo missions to the Moon is that we have these awesome rocks

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that the astronauts brought back. And now combined with the data from LRO,

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we can put those rocks, those samples into context of the entire Moon. So for instance,

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the samples that the astronauts brought back tell us that there are some volatiles 

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inside the Moon. Of course the wonderful high-resolution images of the 

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LROC camera on LRO show us where the astronauts actually walked, so we can put those

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samples they brought back into a context of the landing site, places they went,

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and of course look at the beautiful places that they explored 45 years ago. 

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>>Interviewer: Sounds great, where can we go to learn more? >>Noah: Well the best place to start 

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to learn more about the Moon and the LRO mission is NASA.gov/LRO

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and from there you can learn about each of the instruments, join us on social media,

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and learn more about this wonderful mission. >>Interviewer: Dr. Noah

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Petro, thank you very much! >>Noah: Well thank you for having me.