Researchers are still studying Erg Chech 002 and believe that it can reveal many interesting facts about the formation of planets in the solar system.
The Sahara Desert still hides the secrets of the universe. The latest such discovery was the Erg Chech 002 meteorite, which appeared a million years earlier than the oldest previously discovered meteorite. In addition, it has a different chemical composition and was formed in the bowels of an ancient protoplanet. Correspondent.net tells the details.
The oldest meteorite
Despite the fact that today scientists have at their disposal about three thousand samples of meteorites, the source of which is the crust or mantle of rocky bodies, they represent a limited sample of differentiated objects that formed in the early solar system.
It is believed that 75 percent of such meteorites are fragments of the crust of one asteroid (it is assumed that this is Vesta), and another 20 percent arose in the mantle of a large parent body such as ureilite.
The study of such meteorites makes it possible to understand the processes that took place in large bodies at the dawn of the solar system, and the diversity of the composition of their mantles and crust.
According to research, published in the American journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences in its latest March issue, the meteorite found in May last year, codenamed Erg Chech 002, differs from those found before.
Several pieces of a meteorite with a total mass of 32 kilograms were discovered in May 2020 in the Erg Shesh region, a sandy desert in western Sahara, in the southwestern part of Algeria. The debris immediately attracted attention, as it was clear to specialists that the samples did not belong to chondrites – the most common meteorite on Earth.
Scientists believe Erg Chech 002 is part of a protoplanet. This is the name of a planet in the earliest stages of its emergence, which has already passed the stage of internal melting. This is evidenced by the age of the meteorite – analysis showed that it was formed about 4.6 billion years ago.
By comparison, the Earth is estimated to be 4.5 billion years old. That is, the meteorite arose a little earlier than our planet. For billions of years, it flew through the vastness of the solar system until, in the end, it fell into the Algerian territory of the Sahara.
“This meteorite is the oldest studied igneous rock, which sheds light on the formation of the primary crust that covered the oldest protoplanets,” the study authors write.
Algerian cosmologist Sharif Shabu, one of the country’s leading meteorite specialists, says Erg Chech 002 was nicknamed emerald because it is composed of a green mineral.
He also lamented in a comment to AL Jazeera that the meteorite was split between many scientific laboratories around the world, but despite the large weight of the object, nothing was left for Algeria.
As for why the protoplanet was never born, scientists have one theory: the celestial object was simply destroyed and turned into dust. It is also possible that the protoplanet has become part of some larger object.
The crust of the protoplanet could have been composed of a material referred to as andesite. It is distinguished by the content of a large amount of silica and scientists believe that now it is very difficult to find protoplanets from such material. And all because most of them disappeared without becoming something truly big.
Erg Chech 002 consists of 45 percent lamellar albite feldspar (plagioclase and possibly anorthoclase) containing inclusions of potassium feldspar, 38 percent pyroxene anhydride, and five percent silica minerals (cristobalite and tridymite).
The meteorite itself formed on the surface or close to the surface of the parent body, thus it is a fragment of the magmatic crust of an ancient protoplanet.
To find asteroids similar in composition to Erg Chech 002, scientists compared the spectra of all known groups with the spectrum of this meteorite.
“Erg Chech 002 is clearly different from all asteroid groups, and so far no object has been found with similar spectral characteristics,” the scientists say.
On February 28, another meteorite fell to Earth. Fragments of space rock were found in the small town of Winchcombe in Gloucestershire.
Natural History Museum of London
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It consists of carbonaceous chondrite. This substance is one of the most primitive and ancient materials in the solar system and is known to contain organic substances and amino acids – the ingredients for the origin of life.
Before colliding with Earth’s atmosphere, the space rock moved at nearly 14 kilometers per second and eventually landed on the Winchcombe highway. Other parts of the meteorite were discovered nearby.
According to the London Natural History Museum, footage of the fireball, captured by witnesses and the British Meteorite Club’s network of cameras, helped pinpoint its location and former location in the solar system.
“Nearly all meteorites come from asteroids – these unused building blocks of the solar system can tell us how planets like ours were formed,” says Ashley King, a natural science researcher at the museum.
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