¹Oliver Tschauner, ²Chi Ma, ²John R. Beckett, ³Clemens Prescher, ³Vitali B. Prakapenka, ²George R. Rossman
¹Department of Geoscience and High Pressure Science and Engineering Center, University of Nevada, Las Vegas, NV 89134, USA.
²Division of Geology and Planetary Science, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA 91125, USA.
³Center of Advanced Radiation Sources, University of Chicago, Chicago, IL 60632, USA.

Meteorites exposed to high pressures and temperatures during impact-induced shock often contain minerals whose occurrence and stability normally confine them to the deeper portions of Earth’s mantle. One exception has been MgSiO3 in the perovskite structure, which is the most abundant solid phase in Earth. Here we report the discovery of this important phase as a mineral in the Tenham L6 chondrite and approved by the International Mineralogical Association (specimen IMA 2014-017). MgSiO3-perovskite is now called bridgmanite. The associated phase assemblage constrains peak shock conditions to ~ 24 gigapascals and 2300 kelvin. The discovery concludes a half century of efforts to find, identify, and characterize a natural specimen of this important mineral.

Reference
Tschauner O, Ma C, Beckett JR, Prescher C, Prakapenka VB, Rossman GR (2014) Discovery of bridgmanite, the most abundant mineral in Earth, in a shocked Meteorite. Science 346, 1100-1102
Link to Article [DOI: 10.1126/science.1259369]

Reprinted with permission from AAAS