Talk:Regolith

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Regolith is a layer of loose, heterogeneous material covering a layer of solid rock usually called bedrock. Regolith is present on Earth, the Moon, some asteroids, and other planets. The causes of regolith on earth are weathering and biological processes. On bodies without an atmosphere, regolith is caused by the gravitational reaggregation of debris resulting from impact with other objects. On Earth, it is one of the important factors for most life, since few plants can grow on or within solid rock, and animals would be unable to burrow or build shelter without a loose material.

Pronunciation?

Is it pronounced (Re-Jo-lith) or (Re-Go-lith)?

65.101.228.185 (talk) 23:23, 19 September 2008 (UTC)

in english, g only really palatalizes into a j sound after front vowels (e, i, y), with very few examples -- almost all of which have some historical reason for them, like a front vowel that was there BEFORE but has since been omitted

technically the a in apple is a front vowel, but the ar in park is a literal long vowel, and english doesnt use the term "long vowel" like that-- rather, to refer to historical long vowels, which might have mutated like crazy into something like /ii/ to /ai/ 209.172.31.114 (talk) 21:43, 11 July 2025 (UTC)

sorry, i failed to actually give a clear explicit answer.

it's reg o lith. o is a back vowel 209.172.31.114 (talk) 21:44, 11 July 2025 (UTC)

before*** not after. so like in "gerald" or "gym" -- but not in like, "enigma" or "wig" 209.172.31.114 (talk) 21:49, 11 July 2025 (UTC)

please forgive my hasty and error ridden responses 209.172.31.114 (talk) 21:49, 11 July 2025 (UTC)

Possibly the second.

I majored in geology and generally hear it as reg'-o-lith. With a short e. Flight Risk (talk) 19:39, 17 November 2017 (UTC)

Generality of definition?

Does regolith refer to any loose heterogeneous matter lying atop the bedrock, hence including soil, sand, peat, etc? Or is it loose rocky material only? --Andrew 06:37, Dec 14, 2004 (UTC)

It is the totality of the weathered part of the rock, including the soil, subsoil, saprolite zone and the weathered rock which is in-situ but which is being weathered from fresh silicate minerals to clay minerals. Rolinator 07:42, 10 March 2006 (UTC)

NASA stuff

A chemical composition would have been helpful here. NASA is sponsoring a competition for extracting oxygen (02) from regolith right now. Moon chemical composition of basalt or igneous lava would help researchers answer the question. The story was discussed on WBBM-AM Radio Chicago on Friday 2/25/06. It seemed to me to be possible to create a battery and break up water molecules in the regolith.

James T. Struck

ISBNs

Can't seem to get the ISBN formated correctly. Could someone add 0521334446 to the Lunar Sourcebook reference and then I'll add it elsewhere and some more. Thanks.

David Bigwood

Think it might be a matter of dashes. I used the ISBN-13, if that's ok - Christina Pikas - actually someone removed it so i guess not. I'll try re-editing with the one you have.

"Regolith" on the moon

Why not just call it dust or gravel and leave it at that? Why go about renaming it as "regolith"? You noticed rocks, dirt, dust, and gravel on Earth also belonhing in the category, so what's the problem with calling the pulverized rocks on the moon something similar? 204.52.215.107 02:20, 17 October 2007 (UTC)

What a silly question. Besides the definitions being slightly different, how smart do you think a scientist would feel talking about the 'gravel' layer? They wouldn't, because it's not sciency enough of a word. Gravel is Anglo, only Latin and Greek based words are smart. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.137.159.123 (talk) 04:27, 30 November 2007 (UTC)

Not to mention that regolith has a specific meaning that isn't encompassed by "dust" and "gravel". They don't mean the same thing, so they're not interchangeable. Bryan Derksen (talk) 08:57, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

"everything between fresh rock and fresh air"

As my subject suggests; this is a quote. When I see a quote, I like to know where it came from. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.137.159.123 (talk) 04:25, 30 November 2007 (UTC)

Image of Titan

The caption on this image indicates, "Pebbles on Titan's surface, imaged from a height of about 85 cm by the Huygens spacecraft."

I'm going to venture a guess that the spacecraft was more than 85 cm from the surface. Anyone able to confirm this number? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.212.144.201 (talk) 18:19, 29 July 2009 (UTC)

Spelling

Normally, the spelling would be rhegolith, with a letter ‘h’ following initial ‘r’ for a Greek word beginning with rho. The spelling is in fact misleading, suggesting a “ruling rock.” hgwb (talk) 06:29, 11 July 2010 (UTC)

well, to be pedantic, not just any word beginning with rho -- but specifically instances of rho which have a "rough breathing" mark -- which is basically an accent mark that functioned as the letter h in ancient greek. you see it above vowels mostly, but also the letter rho sometimes, wherever it was transcribed into the roman script as "rh" instead of simply "r" 209.172.31.114 (talk) 21:46, 11 July 2025 (UTC)

Etymology

The German Wikipedia has a different etymology for regolith. It says: ῥῆγμα, regma = Bruch und λἰθος, lithos = Stein (Bruch meaning fracture). This explanation makes as much sense to me as rhegos (ῥῆγος), "blanket"... from this page (regolith is broken, and it covers the rock below). I don't speak any Greek. Which one is correct? --史慧开 (talk) 08:52, 26 June 2011 (UTC)

I imagine it's the latter, though don't have a citation. Based on past experience of scientific use of Greek, the former would have been rendered as "regmalith". This would need a primary cite though - probably back in some horrible grey literature. DanHobley (talk) 10:26, 11 December 2017 (UTC)

OK, the geomorphology bible (Anderson & Anderson, 2010) has the derivation as explicitly the "blanket" one (p. 162). So the English article is correct, unless someone can find a reference to the contrary. DanHobley (talk) 10:29, 11 December 2017 (UTC)

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Graph

Replace it. It's a PNG. The text isn't visible in Dark Mode. ~2025-34898-11 (talk) 19:21, 19 November 2025 (UTC)