[meteorite-list] SNCs

From: S.Singletary <jumper_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Date: Thu Apr 22 09:54:05 2004
Message-ID: <5.0.2.1.2.20020216124435.00a7aa18_at_hesiod>

At 11:29 AM 2/16/2002 -0600, Jamie Ekholm wrote:
>I am just curious. Does anyone know why it seems Shergottites are more
>common than Nakhlites or Chassignites? It just seems that if a new
>Martian meteorite is found, you can almost bet it will be a
>Shergottite. Is it just that they had a better chance of surviving the
>journey from impact on mars to the fall through our atmosphere?
>
>Jamie


There could be any number of reasons for that. The impactor that sent the
SNCs on their way here could have hit an area composed dominantly of
shergottite type rocks or if there were multiple impacts, the distribution
of the types of SNCs could be telling us something of the distribution of
rock types on Mars. As the SNCs are closely related in physical
properties, if not mineralogically, I don't think it tells anything about
re-entry survival characteristics. Anyone else got any ideas?


Steven Singletary
54-1224
Dept. Earth, Atmospheric and Planetary Sciences
M.I.T.
Cambridge, MA 02139
Tel - 617.253.6398
Fax - 617.253.7102
Received on Sat 16 Feb 2002 12:48:14 PM PST