Problems determining relative and absolute ages using the small crater population

The small crater populations (diameter smaller than 1 km) are widely used to date planetary surfaces. The reliability of small crater counts is tested by counting small craters at several young and old lunar surfaces, including Mare Nubium and craters Alphonsus, Tycho and Giordano Bruno. Based on high-resolution images from both the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter Camera and Kaguya Terrain Camera, small craters in two different diameter ranges are counted for each counting area. Large discrepancies exist in both the cumulative (absolute model ages) and relative plots for the two different size ranges of the same counting areas. The results indicate that dating planetary surfaces using small crater populations is highly unreliable because the contamination of secondaries may invalidate the results of small crater counts. A comparison of the size–frequency distributions of the small crater populations and impact ejected boulders around fresh lunar craters shows the same upturn as typical martian secondaries, which supports the argument that secondaries dominate the small crater populations on the Moon and Mars. Also, the size–frequency distributions of small rayed lunar and martian craters of probable primary origin are similar to that of the Population 2 craters on the inner Solar System bodies post-dating Late Heavy Bombardment. Dating planetary surfaces using the small crater populations requires the separation of primaries from secondaries which is extremely difficult. The results also show that other factors, such as different target properties and the subjective identification of impact craters by different crater counters, may also affect crater counting results. We suggest that dating planetary surfaces using small crater populations should be with highly cautious.