There are two minerals that have never been seen before on Earth. Clues to how asteroids form could be held by them.
Two brand new minerals were found in a 2.5 ounce (70 gram) slice of the El Ali meteorite. The managing director of the Arizona State University Interplanetary Initiative and principal investigator of NASA's upcoming Psyche mission named the minerals after the meteorite and elkinstantonite.
"When you find a new mineral, it means that the geological conditions, the chemistry of the rock, was different than what's been found before," says Chris Herd, a professor in the Department of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences. There are two minerals that are new to science in this meteorite.
The largest pink diamond in more than 300 years was found by miners.
El Ali was classified as an Iron IAB complex meteorite. The scientists were interested in the details of the new minerals. They were able to quickly identify the minerals as completely new to nature by comparing them with versions of them that had already been made in a lab.
The meteorites will be investigated further in order to understand the conditions under which the asteroid formed. "How you tease out the geologic processes and the geologic history of the asteroid this rock was once part of is my expertise," he said. I didn't think I would be involved in describing new minerals just because I worked on a meteorite.
Material science applications of the minerals are being looked into by the team.
Future scientific insights from the El Ali meteorite may be at risk. Researchers' access to the space rock could be limited due to the fact that the meteorite has been moved to China.
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