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A new study published in Science has found that Earth’s water may come from materials present in the inner solar system at the time of the formation of the planet – instead of distant comets or such water-carrying asteroids.
Anastatite chondrite meteors, once considered ‘dry’, have enough water to fill the oceans – and then some.
A new study has found that Earth’s water may come from materials present in the inner solar system at the time of the planet’s formation – instead of remotely reaching comets or asteroids delivering such water. Findings published August 28, 2020 Science Indicates that the earth has always been wet.
Researchers at Nancy, France, a postdoctoral fellow at the University of St. Louis and Washington, D.C., at the Center de Reachers Petrographics at Geochemics in France (CRPG, CNRS / University de lauren) have determined that at least three types of unstatite chondrites are the most common type of water. Enough hydrogen, and maybe more.
Anastatite chondritis is made entirely of the inner solar system – essentially the same material that formed the Earth’s core.
“Our findings show that Earth’s water can play a significant role in building blocks,” said Lauret Piani, lead author of CPRG research. “Hydrogen-bearing material was present in the inner solar system at the time of the formation of the rocky planet, although the temperature was too high for the water not to recede.”
The findings of this study are surprising because the building blocks of the earth are often thought to be dry. It comes from the inner regions of the solar system where the temperature would be too high to condense water and come together with other solids during the formation of the planet.
The meteors give a clue that the water was not coming from afar.
“The most interesting part of the discovery for me is that anastatite chondrites, which were thought to be almost ‘dry,’ contained unexpectedly large amounts of water,” said Lionel Wacher, a postdoctoral researcher in physics at the University of Washington. .
Vacher prepared some of the Anastatite chondrites for this analysis for water analysis while he was completing his PhD at the University de Loren. At Washington Washington University, Vetcher is working on understanding the composition of water in other types of meteorites.
Institutite chondritis are rare, accounting for only 2 percent of the known meteorites in the collection.
But their isotopic resemblance to Earth makes them particularly attractive. Anastatite condensates contain oxygen, titanium and calcium isotopes like Earth, and these studies show that their hydrogen and nitrogen isotopes are similar to Earth. In the study of extraterrestrial material, the abundance of isotopes of an element is used as a specific signature to identify where that element originated.
“If Ansetite chondritis were effectively building blocks of our planet – as strongly suggested by their similar isotopic formations – this result suggests that these types of chondritis provide enough water to explain the origin of the Earth’s water, which is amazing!” Wecher said.
The paper also suggests that large amounts of atmospheric nitrogen – the most abundant component of the Earth’s atmosphere – could come from anastatite chondritis.
“Only a few ancient Anastasite chondritis exist: the ones that did not change on their planet or on Earth,” Piani said. “In our study we have carefully selected anesthetized condensed meteorites and applied a special analytical procedure to ensure that they are not biased by the input of terrestrial water.”
The combination of two analytical techniques – conventional mass spectrometry and secondary ion mass spectrometry (SIMS) – allowed researchers to accurately measure the content and composition of small amounts of water in a meteorite.
Prior to the study, “it was generally believed that these chondritis formed near the sun,” Piani said. “Anastatite chondritis was thus generally considered ‘dry’, and this frequent assumption has prevented any analysis for hydrogen from occurring.”
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Reference: “Earth’s water can be inherited from the same material as the Ansetite chondrite meteorites” Herr, Dorian Thoma Massin and Bernard Marty, 28 August Gust 2020, Science.
DOI: 10.1126 / Science
This work was made possible thanks to the collection of the National Museum of Meteorites, including the Field Museum (Chicago, USA), the French National Museum of Natural History (Paris, France), and the Polar Research Institute for Japan (Tokyo, Japan). University of New Mexico (Albuquerque, USA), Museum of Natural History (Vienna, Ria Stria) and CEREG Meteorological Collection (Aix en Provence, France).
