Meteoritics

Meteoritics is a science that deals with meteorites and other extraterrestrial materials that further our understanding of the origin and history of the Solar System. It is closely connected to cosmochemistry, mineralogy and geochemistry. A specialist who studies meteoritics is known as a meteoriticist.

Scientific research in meteoritics includes the collection, identification and classification of meteorites, and the analysis of samples taken from them in a laboratory. Typical analyses include investigation of the minerals that make up the meteorite, their relative locations, orientations and chemical compositions, analysis of isotope ratios and radiometric dating. These techniques are used to determine the age, formation process and subsequent history of the material forming the meteorite. This provides information on the history of the Solar System, how it formed and evolved, and the process of planet formation.

Before the documentation of L'Aigle it was generally believed that meteorites were a type of superstition and those who claimed to see them fall from space were lying.

In 1960 John Reynolds discovered that some meteorites have an excess of ¹²⁹Xe, a result of the presence of ¹²⁹I in the solar nebula.

The presence or absence of certain minerals is indicative of physical and chemical processes. Impacts on the parent body are recorded by impact-breccias and high-pressure mineral phases (e.g. coesite, akimotoite, majorite, ringwoodite, stishovite, wadsleyite). Water bearing minerals are an indicator for hydrothermal activity on the parent body (e.g. clay minerals).

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