[meteorite-list] MISSING PLANETARY INGREDIENT FOUND

From: trandall_at_idsi.net <trandall_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Date: Thu Apr 22 10:04:49 2004
Message-ID: <a05100301b90c4d4239c3_at_[64.72.71.140]>

Thought I'd pass this along for anyone who hasn't seen it yet...

 From Sky & Telescopes news bulletin:

Astronomers know how much sulfur should be in protoplanetary disks, the places
where planets are forming around other stars. Meteorites -- relics from the
earliest epochs of our own solar system -- provide the evidence. Scientists can
take a meteorite into a lab and learn exactly what the rock is made of and how
much of each element it contains.

But observations of protoplanetary disks were confusing at best. If meteorites
indeed tell us the ingredients of the early solar system, then their
composition should match spectroscopic observations of disks. Yet sulfur
appeared to be missing. In a study published in last week's Nature, a team of
researchers led by Lindsay P. Keller have apparently solved the mystery....

Keller's team identified iron sulfide (FeS) to have a broad absorption feature
at 23.5 microns. Previous researchers had attributed the 23-micron line in
space to FeO, not FeS. The "new" abundances of observed sulfur are consistent
with theoretical estimates, assuming that most of the sulfur resides in FeS
grains....

http://SkyandTelescope.com/news/current/article_601_1.asp

Regards,

Tom Randall
IMCA# 6170

-- 

Received on Sat 18 May 2002 02:28:18 PM PDT