Most eucrites and other HED members have a few common cosmic ray exposure age clusters of approximately 7, 10, 14, 22, and 37 m.y. However there are a small number that fall well outside any of these ranges, one example being Macibini (48 +/- 4 m.y.). This may suggest this meteorite is of a different origin, but I have seen no research which addresses this one way or the other. David
-- BEGIN included message
- To: meteorite-list@meteoritecentral.com
- Subject: Re: Eucrites question
- From: Ron Baalke <BAALKE@kelvin.jpl.nasa.gov>
- Date: Fri, 31 Oct 1997 22:27:22 GMT
- Old-X-Envelope-To: <meteorite-list@meteoritecentral.com>
- Reply-To: meteorite-list@meteoritecentral.com
- Resent-Date: Fri, 31 Oct 1997 17:32:22 -0500 (EST)
- Resent-From: meteorite-list@meteoritecentral.com
- Resent-Message-ID: <"2023v.A.vLD.NtlW0"@mu.pair.com>
- Resent-Sender: meteorite-list-request@meteoritecentral.com
I think most scientists agree that all meteorites in the HED group (howardites, eucrites and diogenites) all originate from Vesta, based on matching spectra data. There are actually about 20 asteroids whose spectra match the HED group. Of these 20, Vesta is by far the largest, with most of the others in the 1km size range. Since all 20 these asteroids have very similar orbits, the smaller asteroids are obviously pieces broken off of the largest body, Vesta. So, Vesta is thought to be the parent body of all HED meteorites. I think there are a few exceptions, but I don't know the specific meteorites. Ron Baalke
-- END included message