¹Jens Hopp,^1,2Julian-Christopher Storck,¹Thomas Ludwig,³Smail Mostefaoui,¹Rainer Altherr,^1,4,5Ulrich Ott,¹Hans-Peter Meyer,¹Mario Trieloff
Geochimica et Cosmochimica Acta (in Press) Link to Article [https://doi.org/10.1016/j.gca.2021.07.011]
¹Institut für Geowissenschaften, Klaus-Tschira-Labor für Kosmochemie, Universität Heidelberg, Im Neuenheimer Feld 234-236, D-69120 Heidelberg, Germany
²Institut für Geologie, Universität Bern, Baltzerstrasse 1+3, CH-3012 Bern, Switzerland
³Institut de minéralogie, de physique des matériaux et de cosmochimie, Muséum National d’Histoire Naturelle, Case 52, 57 rue Cuvier, F-75231 Paris Cedex05, France
⁴MTA Atomki, Bem tér 18/c, HU-4026 Debrecen, Hungary
⁵Max-Planck-Institut für Chemie, Hahn-Meitner-Weg 1, D-55128 Mainz
Copyright Elsevier

We investigated the 53Mn-53Cr isotopic composition of a suite of enstatite chondrites by in situ analyses of various mineral phases with the Cameca IMS 1280-HR ion probe at Heidelberg, Germany, and a Cameca NanoSIMS at Paris, France. Only in sphalerite we found anomalies in 53Cr/52Cr-ratios correlating with 55Mn/52Cr which are due to decay of short-lived 53Mn (t1/2=3.7 Ma). A sphalerite in the EH-impact melt LAP 02225 showed the largest excess of 53Cr, with 53Cr/52Cr-ratios ranging up to 2.2. The calculated initial 53Mn/55Mn-ratios are within the range of previous Mn-Cr studies. We observed a spatial variation within a large sphalerite in LAP 02225, translating in distinct initial 53Mn/55Mn values. In case of the EL3 chondrite MAC 88136 the initial 53Mn/55Mn derived for one sphalerite is at the lower end of previously reported values and may reflect a variable influence of alteration-induced exchange of common Cr. This is supported by the total reset of the 53Cr/52Cr-ratio in another sphalerite in contact with an alteration vein irrespective of high Mn/Cr-ratios. Our observed initial 53Mn/55Mn-ratios of Sahara 97158, Indarch and EET 96135 correspond to the I-Xe systematics and hence, show that sphalerites can preserve reasonable age information. For Indarch however, if compared with other initial 53Mn/55Mn values from literature, a considerable scatter is obvious. This clearly demonstrates that the Mn-Cr system in sphalerite can be disturbed by various, still poorly investigated, processes (e.g., by thermal events, weathering, diffusion-controlled remobilization). Future application of Mn-Cr dating to sphalerite in enstatite chondrites thus requires a better understanding of how such processes influence the Mn-Cr systematics and demands for tools to identify the undoubtly present sphalerites carrying a true chronologic information.