Rare 17-pound meteorite discovered in Antarctica - CNN

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During a caller excursion to the icy plains of Antarctica, an planetary squad of researchers discovered 5 caller meteorites — including 1 of the largest ever recovered connected the continent.

The uncommon meteorite is astir the size of a cantaloupe but weighs a hefty 17 pounds (7.7 kilograms). The specimen is 1 of lone astir 100 that size oregon larger discovered successful Antarctica, a premier meteroite-hunting determination wherever much than 45,000 abstraction rocks person been tracked down.

Now, the exceptional find is heading to the Royal Belgian Institute of Natural Sciences successful Brussels, wherever it volition beryllium studied. And Maria Valdes, a probe idiosyncratic astatine Chicago’s Field Museum of Natural History and the University of Chicago who was portion of the expedition team, has kept immoderate of the worldly for her ain analysis.

Valdes’ country of absorption is cosmochemistry. That “broadly means that we usage meteorites to survey the root and improvement of the star strategy done chemic methods,” she told CNN. She’ll instrumentality her samples and usage beardown acids to dissolve them earlier utilizing a process called calibrated chemistry to isolate assorted elements that marque up the rock.

“Then I tin commencement to deliberation astir the root of this rock, however it evolved implicit time, what benignant of genitor assemblage it came from, and wherever successful the star strategy that genitor assemblage formed,” Valdes said. “Those are benignant of the large questions that we effort to address.”

Meteorites onslaught Earth evenly crossed its surface, truthful Antarctica is not location to a disproportionately ample attraction of them, Valdes noted. But the axenic achromatic crystal is an perfect backdrop for spotting the pitchy achromatic rocks.

Hunting for meteroids is “really debased tech and little analyzable than radical mightiness think,” Valdes said. “We’re either walking astir oregon driving connected a snowmobile, looking connected the surface.”

But the squad did person an thought of wherever to look. A January 2022 study utilized outer information to assistance constrictive down locations wherever meteorites were most likely to beryllium found.

“Meteorites themselves are excessively tiny to observe from abstraction with satellites,” Valdes explained. “But this survey utilized outer measurements of aboveground temperature, aboveground slope, aboveground velocity, crystal thickness — things similar this. And it plugged (the data) into a instrumentality learning algorithm to archer america wherever the highest probabilities of uncovering meteorite accumulation zones are.”

Distinguishing a meteorite from different rocks tin beryllium a tricky process, Valdes said. Researchers look for fusion crust, a glassy coating that forms arsenic the cosmic entity plummets done the Earth’s atmosphere.

“A batch of rocks tin look similar they’re meteorites, but they’re not,” she said. “We telephone these meteor-wrongs.”

Another distinguishing diagnostic is the imaginable specimen’s weight. A meteorite volition beryllium overmuch heavier for its size than a emblematic Earth stone due to the fact that it’s packed with dense metals.

The conditions the researchers endured were grueling. Though Valdes and 3 different scientists carried retired their ngo during the continent’s “summer,” which offered 24 hours of daylight, temperatures inactive hovered astir 14 degrees Fahrenheit (minus 10 degrees Celsius), according to a quality merchandise from the Field Museum.

The probe squad spent astir a week and a fractional with a polar tract guide, surviving successful tents pitched connected the icy terrain. However, Valdes said she and her colleagues also spent clip astatine a Belgian probe presumption adjacent Antarctica’s coast, wherever they enjoyed warm, cheesy foods, specified arsenic fondue.

When it comes to aboriginal research, the bully news, Valdes added, is that the 5 meteorites she and her colleagues discovered connected this expedition are conscionable the extremity of the iceberg.

“I’m anxious to spell backmost there, for sure,” she said. “Based connected the outer study, determination are 300,000 meteorites, astatine least, waiting to inactive beryllium collected successful Antarctica. And the larger the (number of) samples that we have, the amended we tin recognize our star system.”

The excursion was led by Vinciane Debaille, a prof astatine the Université Libre de Bruxelles successful Brussels. She and Valdes were joined by Maria Schönbächler, a prof astatine Eidgenössische Technische Hochschule Zurich, and doctoral student Ryoga Maeda of Vrije Universiteit Brussel and the Université Libre de Bruxelles.