[meteorite-list] Brownlees in Rainwater

From: Francis Graham <francisgraham_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Date: Thu, 22 Nov 2007 05:53:00 -0800 (PST)
Message-ID: <330454.30020.qm_at_web58707.mail.re1.yahoo.com>

Hello
  Jerry was thinking along the same lines I was.
I was wondering how one might begin such a study on a
small budget.
  One method that might be used is to gather the iron
spherules that morphologically resemble Brownlees and
put them into a millimeter high and wide pile. Place
them in between two jaws of a 100% copper electric
spark gap. Then, using a Bunsen Kirchoff spectroscope
with a camera in the back --available in most teaching
labs--snap a picture of the spectrum. Repeat with a
similar piece of Gibeon or Campo, and then maybe some
industrial debris. I'll bet the nickel content in the
spectrum will give it away as mostly meteoritic, or
confirm it is not. Nickel has 6 close lines of
emission in the blue-violet region that are
characteristic of it, the second to shortest wavelenth
is actually triple.
  Of course, you'll have no more micrometeorite sample
doing this test--it will vaporize. But at least then
you could be fairly sure what the next micrometeorite
candidates you collect are.
  So now that I have done my thinking on line, it must
be actually attempted!

Francis Graham





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Received on Thu 22 Nov 2007 08:53:00 AM PST