Different Directions

Different Directions

Chondrule Formation by Impact?

The CB chondrites (at least Gujba and HH 237) formed after the solar nebula had finished being energetic. Yet their formation indicates an energetic process was involved.

For example, the metal was melted and some seems to have formed from a vapor. Chondrules were totally molten droplets that contained no pre-existing debris and cooled rapidly. All these features point a cosmic finger at formation during an impact event.

In a collision between large objects, there is a lot of vaporization and melting. These hot conditions provide settings in which metal nodules and skeletal olivine chondrules form by melting, and cryptocrystlline chondrules (which are smaller) are made by condensation from a vapor.

There are no unmelted remnants of the original materials left in these meteorites. This is consistent with their formation by impact between two objects the size of Earth's Moon. Such a monumental collision would separate melt and vapor from unmelted materials.

Chondrule Formation by Impact?

Collision between two Moon-sized (or larger) objects in the early Solar System would have produced vast amounts of melt and vapor, from which the components in CB chondrites could have formed. Such impacts may have been common for a few million years early in the evolution of the Solar System.

 

Paleo Fun

Pages

The Mary Elizabeth Collection

Solar System
Before the Beginning
Our Beginning

Comets
    Stardust - A Robotic Mission


The Stones
    Abee - The Mystery
    Allende - A Blast
    Axtell
    Bonita Springs
    Cat Mountain
    Chergach (aka Mali)
    Claxton
    Gujba
    Kendleton
    Melrose - The Golden One
    Millbillillie
    Mundrabilla
    Murchison
    Saratov
    Vesta & Its Meteorites
        Bilanga
        Chaves
        Sioux County
Stony Irons
    Beautiful Esquel
    Brenham
    Pallas Iron
    Vaca Muerta
The Irons
    An American Icon
    Campo Del Cielo
    Cape of Good Hope
    Coahuila
    Gibeon
    Henbury
    The Mythic Kaalijarv
    Nantan
    Nelson County
    Sikhote-Alin
    Wolfe Creek
Historic Meteorites
    Orgueil - & the Comet
    Pultusk Shower
    Weston

Glossary

Impact Features
   Rocks
   Craters of the World
   Events
   Mass Extinctions

Moon Rocks FAQs

Links

Types of Meteorites
   Pallasites -- A Rare View
Meteor Showers
Interesting meteorite falls

NASA's Earth & Space Sciences

Near-Earth Object (NEO) Program
Basic Science II: Impact Cratering
Chesapeake Bay impact crater

Media

Peekskill N.Y. fireball video
London Natural History Museum video
Video of crater in Arizona
Understanding: Prehistoric Meteor Hit the Caribbean Sea

CURRENT MOON

National Geographic News

Discover Space

If interested in meteorites, we are happy to link you to these outstanding sites: