[meteorite-list] Meteorite reveals rare unstable element

From: MexicoDoug <mexicodoug_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Date: Fri, 11 Mar 2016 18:08:36 -0500
Message-ID: <15367f0533d-4803-5500_at_webprd-m04.mail.aol.com>

Zelimir writes:

"I was mainly intrigued by the pink CAI but nobody could provide me some explanation. I don't claim the same phenomenon (presence of curium) is responsible of that color in my sample but now I can't help imagining that the curium hypothesis could possibly also explain the color of my CAI."

Zelimir, Lucky specimen! I had some mullings on this:

I would rule out that the presence of curium lent the pink color to your CAI. Right, the authors do not claim that curium is responsible for the pink color in their sample, or that there is presently any curium in the sample either. I think the amounts of curium are quite tiny to yield any color, they are dealing with.

Just a wild guess, but if your beautiful pink CAI happens to be like the one in the citation, the "CAI" likely has a matrix of Iron-rich spinel fine crystals which just happen to be tinged by Cr(III) in them according to 35 year old analyses on a pink CAI, or more descriptively, a MASHI, that was formed from/as an altered CAI possibly on an extremely old parent body that had volatiles, lots of salts and acid floating around. Note the rich Cr2O3 assay of the interior here:
http://articles.adsabs.harvard.edu/full/1981LPI....12...25A

An image I have is a radioactive heated proto-planet with nasty lakes and your pink CAI stuck festering and staining pink in a dirty, salty, pool on it until the day something smashed the protoplanet to little bits and only after that prehistory did Allende condense. (I bet if you licked the inclusion it would taste like salt). Whether the pool contained water I wonder, too. For a nice spinel colored by Cr(III) look up the Timur "Ruby"... or click on this
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spinel#/media/File:Spinel2.jpg

It was not clear for me where the samples were coming from in this paper. It's fairly clear they are all Allende specimens, and going by the footnotes and guessing about the sample numbers, it looks like Chicago had two coarse grained CAIs that were extracted for the paper, and the rest of the samples were from the Fields Museum donations, where the researchers destructively analyzed pieces of the CAIs they extracted, looking for fine grained ones perhaps were reminiscent of the old "Pink Angel" an inclusion that was close to the heart of Jerry Wasserburg.

IMO They would have been better off naming it "Curious Jerry" for Wasserburg, who helped open the Pandora's Box of CAI's and was a principal discoverer that radioactive aluminum provided early energy for the activities of forming early protoplanets along with explanations where the pre-sources of solar nebula material were. This find of evidence of curium, IMO, is an extension of that in some ways and probably vindicates some of the speculation and scientific battles Wasserburg and colleagues dealt with after the Allende fall when using Allende, moon rocks and meteorites in general to figure out what created our local neighborhood As for all the silly names, given that this is a non-FUN CAI that might be a MASHI, the only thing that is clear to me is that this is all the work of Lunatics ;) Anyway, I don't think Marie Curie's favorite color was pink in that day. I picture her more pale green and beautifully glowing!

Blue skies & pink CAIs
Doug


-----Original Message-----
From: Zelimir Gabelica via Meteorite-list <meteorite-list at meteoritecentral.com>
To: mineral <mineral at optonline.net>
Cc: Meteoritelist <Meteorite-list at meteoritecentral.com>
Sent: Wed, Mar 9, 2016 11:45 am
Subject: Re: [meteorite-list] Meteorite reveals rare unstable element

Hello Derek, ListVery exciting reading !For info, I have acquired in 2013 a 14.7 g Allende fragment that also shows a nice 9.5x5 mm CAI exhibiting a neatly distinct pink color (and also a curious reddish-brown color on some of its (black) crust areas).I was mainly intrigued by the pink CAI but nobody could provide me some explanation. I don't claim the same phenomenon (presence of curium) is responsible of that color in my sample but now I can't help imagining that the curium hypothesis could possibly also explain the color of my CAI. Probably worth some further analysis ?Regards to all,Zelimir----- Mail original ----- De: "mineral via Meteorite-list" <meteorite-list at meteoritecentral.com> ?: "Meteoritelist" <Meteorite-list at meteoritecentral.com> Envoy?: Mercredi 9 Mars 2016 15:15:28 Objet: [meteorite-list] Meteorite reveals rare unstable element http://earthsky.org/space/meteorite-reveals-rare-unstable-element Thanks, Derek. ______________________________________________ Visit our Facebook page https://
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Received on Fri 11 Mar 2016 06:08:36 PM PST