Geological Chronicle
Located on the far side of the Moon, Lomonosov is an impact crater spanning 90.69 kilometers in diameter. Formed during the Lower (Early) Imbrian period, it sits adjacent to several neighboring formations, almost attached to the east-northeastern outer rim of the larger crater Joliot and overlying the southern rim of Maxwell. Attached to Lomonosov's southern rim is the smaller crater Edison.
The interior floor of Lomonosov was resurfaced by lava flows, leaving a dark, level surface across its lowest elevations. Much of the inner rim wall remains uncovered by the flooding, displaying slumped material along its base and narrowing along the northern edge where the crater overlies Maxwell. Only a few tiny craterlets and streaks of ray material from Giordano Bruno mark the dark plain.
In 1961, the International Astronomical Union formally named the crater Lomonosov in honor of Mikhail Vasilievich Lomonosov, the eighteenth-century Russian scientist, poet, and grammarian.