[meteorite-list] Octahedrite formation and Mars

From: martinh_at_isu.edu <martinh_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Date: Thu Oct 28 19:16:03 2004
Message-ID: <75ef2c75b82a.75b82a75ef2c_at_isu.edu>

Hello Thomas and All,

Actually, I would suspect the earth does not YET have a Widmanstatten patterned core since the crystal formation is a solid state creation once the iron has solidified (cooled below the melting point) of which I believe the earth's core is still liquid.

Just my thoughts. Maybe the MESSENGER mission to Mercury (which is 60-65 percent core) will shed more light on this topic.

Cheers,

Martin



----- Original Message -----
From: Thomas Kurtz <thomas.kurtz_at_stud.fh-hannover.de>
Date: Thursday, October 28, 2004 4:19 pm
Subject: RE: [meteorite-list] Octahedrite formation and Mars

> Yes, and in the core of our earth there are Widmanstaetten pattern
> too.Unfortunately, we will never dig it out :-)
>
> Regards,
>
> Thomas, California.
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: meteorite-list-bounces_at_meteoritecentral.com
> [meteorite-list-bounces_at_meteoritecentral.com] On Behalf Of tracy
> latimer
> Sent: Wednesday, October 27, 2004 10:52 PM
> To: meteorite-list_at_meteoritecentral.com
> Subject: [meteorite-list] Octahedrite formation and Mars
>
> I was just reading Meteorites and the Origin of Planets, by John
> A. Wood.
> In it, I found a statement that octahedrites are formed by
> exceptionally
> slow cooling over millions of years, such as might be found in the
> insulated
> center of a planetoid. We already know that Mars has a very weak
> magnetic
> field and negligible vulcanism, leading some scientists to believe
> that its
> core has largely cooled. Might this mean that, if we were able to
> extract a
>
> chunk of Martian core, it would exhibit an octahedral pattern?
> Anyone care
> to speculate on the nickel content of the Martian core?
>
> Mars is one big Wiedmanstatten pattern!
> Tracy Latimer
>
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Received on Thu 28 Oct 2004 07:15:59 PM PDT