Long-term variations of solar corpuscular fluxes based on lunar soil samples

We report the results of age determination of a lunar soil column, delivered by the Luna 16 mission in September 1970 from the Sea of Fertility. We elaborated and applied the soil age determination method using the kinetic parameter, the regolith accumulation rate. The age of the soil delivered by Luna 16 is about 90 Myr. The isotopic ratio of ³He/⁴He in the column is slightly higher than in the soil column delivered by the Luna 24 mission. The abundance of helium in the fine fraction of the soil (about 100 µm) is significantly higher and is close to the maximum abundance from the Luna 24 soil column. These differences are most likely associated with the variations of solar corpuscular fluxes. Based on the measurements of the helium isotope abundance in the samples of lunar soil columns, we have estimated the values of ancient solar fluxes of protons and helium and variations thereof in the time interval of up to 600 Myr. We demonstrate that during this epoch there were two strong bursts of the helium flux, about 80 and 470 Myr ago, respectively. The existence of the first peak was assumed earlier from the paleodendrochronological data.