¹B.G. Rider-Stokes, ¹S.L. Jackson, ^2,3T.H. Burbine, ¹L.F. White, ¹R.C. Greenwood, ⁴E.M. MacLennan, ¹M. Anand, ⁵A. Yamaguchi, ¹M.M. Grady
Icarus (in Press) Link to Article [https://doi.org/10.1016/j.icarus.2024.116429]
¹School of Physical Sciences, The Open University, Milton Keynes MK7 6AA, UK
²Department of Astronomy, Mount Holyoke College, 50 College Street, South Hadley, MA 01075, USA
³Planetary Science Institute, 1700 East Fort Lowell, Suite 106, Tucson, AZ 85719, USA
⁴Department of Physics, University of Helsinki, Finland
⁵National Institute of Polar Research, Tachikawa, Tokyo 190-8518, Japan
Copyright Elsevier

It is hypothesized that the Solar System was once populated by Moon to Mars-sized planetary embryos, however, resulting debris from their disruptions is not easily discernible in the modern-day Solar System. Angrites are among the oldest differentiated materials in our Solar System, recording prolonged magmatism, and their parent body is expected to have been Moon to Mars-sized. Even so, no parent body in the modern-day Solar System has been identified. Our UV–Vis-NIR spectra of ten angrites, compared with 712 asteroids, reveal multiple candidates with spectral similarities through curve matching and band-structure analysis. Asteroid (246) Asporina provides the best analog for the angrite meteorites, potentially representing a fragment of a long-lost Moon to Mars-sized body that once resided in the inner Solar System, which was subsequently incorporated into the growing terrestrial planets.