¹Daniela Comelli et al. (>10*)
¹Dipartimento di Fisica, Politecnico di Milano, Milano, Italy
*Find the extensive, full author and affiliation list on the publishers website

Scholars have long discussed the introduction and spread of iron metallurgy in different civilizations. The sporadic use of iron has been reported in the Eastern Mediterranean area from the late Neolithic period to the Bronze Age. Despite the rare existence of smelted iron, it is generally assumed that early iron objects were produced from meteoritic iron. Nevertheless, the methods of working the metal, its use, and diffusion are contentious issues compromised by lack of detailed analysis. Since its discovery in 1925, the meteoritic origin of the iron dagger blade from the sarcophagus of the ancient Egyptian King Tutankhamun (14th C. BCE) has been the subject of debate and previous analyses yielded controversial results. We show that the composition of the blade (Fe plus 10.8 wt% Ni and 0.58 wt% Co), accurately determined through portable x-ray fluorescence spectrometry, strongly supports its meteoritic origin. In agreement with recent results of metallographic analysis of ancient iron artifacts from Gerzeh, our study confirms that ancient Egyptians attributed great value to meteoritic iron for the production of precious objects. Moreover, the high manufacturing quality of Tutankhamun’s dagger blade, in comparison with other simple-shaped meteoritic iron artifacts, suggests a significant mastery of ironworking in Tutankhamun’s time.

Reference
Comelli D et al. (2016) The meteoritic origin of Tutankhamun’s iron dagger blade. Meteoritics & Planetary Science (in Press)
Link to Article [DOI: 10.1111/maps.12664]
Published by arrangement with John Wiley & Sons

¹Richard W. Court, ¹Jonathan Tan
¹Impacts and Astromaterials Research Centre, Department of Earth Science and Engineering, Imperial College, London, UK

Ablation of micrometeoroids during atmospheric entry yields volatile gases such as water, carbon dioxide, and sulfur dioxide, capable of altering atmospheric chemistry and hence the climate and habitability of the planetary surface. While laboratory experiments have revealed the yields of these gases during laboratory simulations of ablation, the reactions responsible for the generation of these gases have remained unclear, with a typical assumption being that species simply undergo thermal decomposition without engaging in more complex chemistry. Here, pyrolysis–Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy reveals that mixtures of meteorite-relevant materials undergo secondary reactions during simulated ablation, with organic matter capable of taking part in carbothermic reduction of iron oxides and sulfates, resulting in yields of volatile gases that differ from those predicted by simple thermal decomposition. Sulfates are most susceptible to carbothermic reduction, producing greater yields of sulfur dioxide and carbon dioxide at lower temperatures than would be expected from simple thermal decomposition, even when mixed with meteoritically relevant abundances of low-reactivity Type IV kerogen. Iron oxides were less susceptible, with elevated yields of water, carbon dioxide, and carbon monoxide only occurring when mixed with high abundances of more reactive Type III kerogen. We use these insights to reinterpret previous ablation simulation experiments and to predict the reactions capable of occurring during ablation of carbonaceous micrometeoroids in atmospheres of different compositions.

Reference
Court RW, Tan J (2016) Insights into secondary reactions occurring during atmospheric ablation of micrometeoroids. Meteoritics & Planetary Science (in Press)
Link to Article [DOI: 10.1111/maps.12652]
Published by arrangement with John Wiley & Sons

¹A. Kar, ¹A.K. Sen, ²R. Gupta
¹Department of Physics, Assam University, Silchar-788011, India
²Inter-University Centre for Astronomy and Astrophysics, Pune-411007, India

New Laboratory phase curves are presented, to examine the effect of porosity on reflectance as a function of phase angle for grain size having dimension about half, twice and those larger than the illuminating wavelength. The experimental setup used for generating reflectance data is a goniometric device developed at the Dept. of Physics, Assam University, Silchar, India. Some of the well-documented samples having different sizes were chosen; alumina, olivine, basalt, rutile, chromite and iron. The sample surfaces were prepared with different porosities, in order to simulate natural regolith surface as much as possible. The wavelength of observation is 632.8 nm. A model based on the Radiative Transfer Equation is presented here to analyze and model the laboratory data. In the present modelling work, the empirical relation of Hapke, Mie theory and Henyey-Greenstein phase function are used. For particles having dimension about half, twice to the wavelength, Mie theory is used to calculate single scattering albedo. Although the Mie theory is insufficient for describing the scattering properties of particles larger than the wavelength, for such large particle single scattering albedo (SSA) is estimated through method of best fit. It has been found that, the porosity has a distinguishable effect on reflectance. Also the contribution of multiple scattering function for different porosity is examined. Further the results presented in the current work, demonstrates the light scattering properties of a diverse collections of regolith like samples.

Reference
Kar A, Sen AK, Gupta R (2016) Laboratory photometry of regolith analogues: effect of porosity. Icarus (in Press)
Link to Article [doi:10.1016/j.icarus.2016.05.024]
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