1,2R. H. Hewins,3H. Leroux,3D. Jacob,1S. Pont,1O. Beyssac,1V. Malarewicz,4J.-P. Lorand,5P.-M. Zanetta,1B. Zanda
Meteoritics & Planetary Science (in Press) Link to Article [https://doi.org/10.1111/maps.14028]
1IMPMC, MNHN, UMR CNRS 7590, Sorbonne Université, Paris, France
2Earth and Planetary Sciences, Rutgers University, Piscataway, New Jersey, USA
3CNRS, INRAE, Centrale Lille, UMR 8207—UMET—Unité Matériaux et Transformations, Univ. Lille, Lille, France
4LPG Nantes, UMR CNRS 6112, Univ. Nantes, Nantes, France
5Lunar and Planetary Laboratory, University of Arizona, Tucson, Arizona, USA
Published by arrangement with John Wiley & Sons
Shergottites have provided abundant information on the volcanic and impact history of Mars. Northwest Africa (NWA) 14672 contributes to both of these aspects. It is a vesicular ophitic depleted olivine–phyric shergottite, with average plagioclase An61Ab39Or0.2. It is highly ferroan, with pigeonite compositions En49-25Fs41-61Wo10-14 like those of basaltic shergottites, for example, NWA 12335. Olivine (Fo53-15) has discrete ferroan overgrowths, more ferroan when in contact with plagioclase than when enclosed by pyroxene. The pyroxene (a continuum of augite, subcalcic augite, and pigeonite) is patchy, with ragged “cores” enveloped or invaded by ferroan pyroxene. Magma mixing may be responsible for capture of olivine and formation of pyroxene mantles. The plagioclase is maskelynite-like in appearance, but the original laths were (congruently) melted and the melt partly crystallized as fine dendrites. Most of the 14% vesicles occur within plagioclase. Olivine, pyroxene, and ilmenite occur in part as fine aggregates crystallized after congruent melting with limited subsequent liquid mixing. There are two fine-grained melt components, barred plagioclase with interstitial Fe-bearing phases, and glass with olivine dendrites, derived by melting of mainly plagioclase and mainly pyroxene, respectively. Rare silica particles contain coesite and/or quartz, and silica glass. The rock has experienced >50% melting, compatible with peak pressure >~65 GPa. It is the most highly shocked shergottite so far, at shock stage S6/7. It may belong to the group of depleted shergottites ejected at ~1 Myr from Tooting Crater.
Month: July 2023
Reconciling fast and slow cooling during planetary formation as recorded in the main group pallasites
1M. Murphy Quinlan,2A.M. Walker,1C.J. Davies
Earth and Planetary Science Letters 618, 118284 Link to Article [https://doi.org/10.1016/j.epsl.2023.118284]
1School of Earth and Environment, University of Leeds, Leeds, UK
2Department of Earth Sciences, University of Oxford, Oxford, UK
Copyright Elsevier
Pallasite meteorites contain evidence for vastly different cooling timescales: rapid cooling at high temperatures (K/yrs) and slow cooling at lower temperatures (K/Myrs). Pallasite olivine also shows contrasting textures ranging from well-rounded to angular and fragmental, and some samples record chemical zoning. Previous pallasite formation models have required fortuitous changes to the parent body in order to explain these contrasting timescales and textures, including late addition of a megaregolith layer, impact excavation, or parent body break-up and recombination. We investigate the timescales recorded in Main Group Pallasite meteorites with a coupled multiscale thermal diffusion modelling approach, using a 1D model of the parent body and a 3D model of the metal-olivine intrusion region, to see if these large-scale changes to the parent body are necessary. We test a range of intrusion volumes and aspect ratios, metal-to-olivine ratios, and initial temperatures for both the background mantle and the intruded metal. We find that the contrasting timescales, textural heterogeneity, and preservation of chemical zoning can all occur within one simple ellipsoidal segment of an intrusion complex. These conditions are satisfied in 13% of our randomly generated models (2200 model runs), with small intrusion volumes (with a mean radius ≲100 m) and colder background mantle temperatures (≲1200 K) favourable. Large rounded olivine can be explained by a previous intrusion of metal into a hotter mantle, suggesting possible repeated bombardment of the parent body. We speculate that the formation of pallasitic zones within planetesimals may have been a common occurrence in the early Solar System, as our model shows that favourable pallasite conditions can be accommodated in a wide range of intrusion morphologies, across a wide range of planetesimal mantle temperatures, without the need for large-scale changes to the parent body. We suggest that pallasites represent a late stage of repeated injection of metal into a cooling planetesimal mantle, and that heterogeneity observed in micro-scale rounding or chemical zoning preservation in pallasite olivine can be explained by diverse cooling rates in different regions of a small intrusion.
Asynchronous accretion can mimic diverse white dwarf pollutants I: core and mantle fragments
1Brouwers, Marc G.,1Bonsor, Amy,2,3Malamud, Uri
Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society 519, 2646-2662 Open Access Link to Article [DOI
10.1093/mnras/stac3316]
1Institute of Astronomy, University of Cambridge, Madingley Road, Cambridge, CB3 0HA, United Kingdom
2Department of Physics, Technion − Israel Institute of Technology, Technion City, Haifa, 3200003, Israel
3School of the Environment and Earth Sciences, Tel Aviv University, Ramat Aviv, Tel Aviv, 6997801, Israel
We currently do not have a copyright agreement with this publisher and cannot display the abstract here
Silica Polymorphs Formation in the Jänisjärvi Impact Structure: Tridymite, Cristobalite, Quartz, Trace Stishovite and Coesite
1Zamiatina, Daria A.,1Zamyatin, Dmitry A.,1Mikhalevskii, Georgii B.,1Chebikin, Nikolai S.
Minerals 13, 686 Link to Article [DOI 10.3390/min13050686]
1The Zavaritsky Institute of Geology and Geochemistry, Ural Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Ekaterinburg, 620016, Russian Federation
We currently do not have a copyright agreement with this publisher and cannot display the abstract here
Meteorite fall in Bhojade village, Kopargaon taluk, Ahmednagar district, Maharashtra, India
1Ray D.,1Shukla A.D.,1Bhardwaj, Anil
Current Science 124, 1138-1139 Link to Article [ISSN00113891]
1Physical Research Laboratory, Ahmedabad, 380 009, India
We currently do not have a copyright agreement with this publisher and cannot display the abstract here
Mineralogy, morphology, and emplacement history of the Maaz formation on the Jezero crater floor from orbital and rover observations
1Briony Horgan et al. (>10)
Journal of Geophysical Research (Planets)(in Press) Link to Article [https://doi.org/10.1029/2022JE007612]
1Department of Earth, Atmospheric, and Planetary Sciences, Purdue University, West 19 Lafayette, IN 47906
Published by arrangement with John Wiley & Sons
The first samples collected by the Perseverance rover on the Mars 2020 mission were from 60 the Maaz formation, a lava plain that covers most of the floor of Jezero crater. Laboratory 61 analysis of these samples back on Earth would provide important constraints on the petrologic 62 history, aqueous processes, and timing of key events in Jezero crater. However, interpreting 63 these samples requires a detailed understanding of the emplacement and modification history of 64 the Maaz formation. Here we synthesize rover and orbital remote sensing data to link outcrop-65 scale interpretations to the broader history of the crater, including Mastcam-Z mosaics and 66 multispectral images, SuperCam chemistry and reflectance point spectra, RIMFAX ground 67 penetrating radar, and orbital hyperspectral reflectance and high-resolution images. We show 68 that the Maaz formation is composed of a series of distinct members corresponding to basaltic to 69 basaltic-andesite lava flows. The members exhibit variable spectral signatures dominated by 70 high-Ca pyroxene, Fe-bearing feldspar, and hematite, which can be tied directly to igneous 71 grains and altered matrix in abrasion patches. Spectral variations correlate with morphological 72 variations, from recessive layers that produce a regolith lag in lower Maaz, to weathered 73 polygonally fractured paleosurfaces and crater-retaining massive blocky hummocks in upper 74 Maaz. The Maaz members were likely separated by one or more extended periods of time, and 75 were subjected to variable erosion, burial, exhumation, weathering, and tectonic modification. 76 The two unique samples from the Maaz formation are representative of this diversity, and 77 together will provide an important geochronological framework for the history of Jezero crater.
Trace element redistributions during metamorphism of E-chondrites: implications for reduced bodies and the Earth
1,2Jean-Alix Barrat,3Addi Bischoff,4Brigitte Zanda
Geochimica et Cosmochimica Acta (in Press) Link to Article [https://doi.org/10.1016/j.gca.2023.07.003]
1Univ Brest, CNRS, UMR 6539 (Laboratoire des Sciences de l’Environnement Marin), Institut Universitaire Européen de la Mer (IUEM), Place Nicolas Copernic, 29280 Plouzané, France
2Institut Universitaire de France, Paris
3Institut für Planetologie, University of Münster, Wilhelm-Klemm-Str. 10, D-48149 Münster, Germany
4Muséum National d’Histoire Naturelle, Laboratoire de Minéralogie et de Cosmochimie du Muséum, CNRS UMR7202, 61 rue Buffon, 75005 Paris, France
Copyright Elsevier
We report on new trace element analyses of enstatite chondrites (ECs) to clarify their behavior during the metamorphism. During the transition from a type 3 to a type 5 or higher, silicates lose a large portion of their trace elements to sulfides. Our procedure allows us to obtain trace element abundances of the silicate fraction of an EC quite easily. The element patterns of these fractions (especially REE patterns) are quite different for EH and EL chondrites, and are furthermore dependent on the metamorphic grade. This procedure can be usefull to classify meteorites, in particular when the sulfides are altered. Applied to anomalous ECs, it allows direct recognition of the EH affinity of QUE 94204, and suggests that Zakłodzie, NWA 4301, and NWA 4799 derive from the same EH-like body of previously unsampled composition.
We have used the concentrations obtained on the silicate fractions of the most metamorphosed chondrites to discuss the chemical characteristics of the primitive mantles of reduced bodies of EH or EL affinity (i.e., after core segregation). Our data indicate that these mantles are very depleted in refractory lithophile elements (RLEs), particularly in rare earth elements (REEs), and notably show significant positive anomalies in Sr, Zr, Hf, and Ti. These estimates imply that the cores contain most of the REEs, U and Th of these bodies. Interestingly, the inferred primitive mantles of these reduced bodies contrast with that of the Earth. If the Earth accreted essentially from ECs, one would expect similar signatures to be preserved, which is not the case. This mismatch can be explained either by a later homogenization of the bulk silicate Earth, or alternatively, that the materials that were accreted were isotopically similar to ECs, but mineralogically different (i.e., oldhamite-free).
On the origin of fluorine-poor apatite in chondrite parent bodies
1Francis M. McCubbin,1, Jonathan A. Lewis,2, Jessica J. Barnes,1, Jeremy W. Boyce,1,3Juliane Gross, 4Molly C. McCanta,5,6Poorna Srinivasan, 7Brendan A. Anzures,1Nicole G. Lunning,1, Stephen M. Elardo,1Lindsay P. Keller,9Tabb C. Prissel,5,6Carl B. Agee
American Mineralogist 108, 1185-1200 Link to Article [http://www.minsocam.org/msa/ammin/toc/2023/Abstracts/AM108P1185.pdf]
1NASA Johnson Space Center, Mailcode XI, 2101 NASA Parkway, Houston, Texas 77058, U.S.A.
2Lunar and Planetary Laboratory, University of Arizona, 1629 E University Boulevard, Tucson, Arizona 85721, U.S.A.
3Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences, Rutgers University, Piscataway, New Jersey 08854, U.S.A.
4Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences, University of Tennessee, Knoxville, Tennessee 37996, U.S.A. 5
5Institute of Meteoritics, University of New Mexico, 200 Yale Boulevard SE, Albuquerque, New Mexico 87131, U.S.A.
6Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences, University of New Mexico, 200 Yale Boulevard SE, Albuquerque, New Mexico 87131, U.S.A.
7Lunar and Planetary Institute, 3600 Bay Area Boulevard, Houston, Texas 77058, U.S.A.
8Department of Geological Sciences, University of Florida, Gainesville, Florida 32611, U.S.A.
9Jacobs, NASA Johnson Space Center, 2101 NASA Parkway, Houston, Texas 77058, U.S.A.
Copyright: The Mineralogical Socuety of America
We conducted a petrologic study of apatite within one LL chondrite, six R chondrites, and six CK
chondrites. These data were combined with previously published apatite data from a broader range of chondrite meteorites to determine that chondrites host either chlorapatite or hydroxylapatite with ≤33 mol% F
in the apatite X-site (unless affected by partial melting by impacts, which can cause F-enrichment of
residual apatite). These data indicate that either fluorapatite was not a primary condensate from the solar
nebula or that it did not survive lower temperature nebular processes and/or parent body processes.
Bulk-rock Cl and F data from chondrites were used to determine that the solar system has a Cl/F ratio of
10.5 ± 1.0 (3σ). The Cl/F ratios of apatite from chondrites are broadly reflective of the solar system Cl/F
value, indicating that apatite in chondrites is fluorine poor because the solar system has about an order
of magnitude more Cl than F. The Cl/F ratio of the solar system was combined with known apatite-melt
partitioning relationships for F and Cl to predict the range of apatite compositions that would form from
a melt with a chondritic Cl/F ratio. This range of apatite compositions allowed for the development of a
crude model to use apatite X-site compositions from achondrites (and chondrite melt rocks) to determine
whether they derive from a volatile-depleted and/or differentiated source, albeit with important caveats
that are detailed in the manuscript. This study further highlights the utility of apatite as a mineralogical
tool to understand the origin of volatiles (including H2O) and the diversity of their associated geological
processes throughout the history of our solar system, including at its nascent stage.
LavAtmos: An open-source chemical equilibrium vaporization code for lava worlds
1Christiaan P. A. van Buchem,1,2Yamila Miguel,1Mantas Zilinskas,3Wim van Westrenen
Meteoritics & Planetary Science (in Press) Open Access Link to Article [https://doi.org/10.1111/maps.13994]
1Leiden Observatory, Leiden University, Leiden, The Netherlands
2SRON Netherlands Institute for Space Research, Leiden, The Netherlands
3Faculty of Science, Earth Sciences, Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
Published by arrangement with John Wiley & Sons
To date, over 500 short-period rocky planets with equilibrium temperatures above1500 K have been discovered. Such planets are expected to support magma oceans,providing a direct interface between the interior and the atmosphere. This provides a uniqueopportunity to gain insight into their interior compositions through atmosphericobservations. A key process in doing such work is the vapor outgassing from the lavasurface. LavAtmos is an open-source code that calculates the equilibrium chemicalcomposition of vapor above a dry melt for a given composition and temperature. Resultsshow that the produced output is in good agreement with the partial pressures obtainedfrom experimental laboratory data as well as with other similar codes from literature.LavAtmos allows for the modeling of vaporization of a wide range of different mantlecompositions of hot rocky exoplanets. In combination with atmospheric chemistry codes,this enables the characterization of interior compositions through atmospheric signatures.
Development of preparation methods of polished sections of returned samples from asteroid Ryugu by the Hayabusa2 spacecraft
1Daisuke Nakashima,1Yuri Fujioka,1Kanchi Katayama,1Tomoyo Morita,1Mizuha Kikuiri,1Kana Amano,1Eiichi Kagawa,1Tomoki Nakamura
Meteoritics & Planetary Science (in Press) Link to Article [https://doi.org/10.1111/maps.14036]
1Department of Earth Science, Tohoku University, Sendai, Japan
Published by arrangement with John Wiley & Sons
Preparation procedures of polished sections of the Ryugu samples returned by theHayabusa2 spacecraft were established through tests using CI and CM chondrites as analogmaterials of the Ryugu samples and processing of the Ryugu samples. The proceduresconsisted of four steps: epoxy-coating, embedding in epoxy cylinders, cutting with a wiresaw, and dry polish by hand. There are three key points for successful preparation of thepolished sections: (1) ethanol-mixed epoxy with low viscosity for reinforcing the fragilesamples, (2) handling under dry conditions to avoid breakup of the samples on contact withliquids due to their highly porous nature, and (3) X-ray computed tomography data forexposing maximum surface areas of target mineral phases and clasts. These key points mayalso be important for processing of samples returned from asteroid Bennu and the MartianMoon Phobos, as those samples are likely to be hydrous carbonaceous chondrite-likematerials. The established procedures induce two side effects: zoning of the polished surfaceof the Ryugu samples in scanning electron microscope images reflecting differences incarbon contents due to permeation of low viscosity epoxy resin into the sample surface andfractures in anhydrous minerals possibly due to shear stress during dry polishing.