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TOPIC: Yukon Meteor
Blobrana


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Tagish Lake meteorite
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Life on Earth may have started with the help of tiny hollow spheres that formed in the cold depths of space, a new study suggests. The analysis of carbon bubbles found in a meteorite shows they are not Earth contaminants and must have formed in temperatures near absolute zero.
The bubbles, called globules, were discovered in 2002 in pieces of a meteorite that had landed on the frozen surface of Tagish Lake in British Columbia, Canada, in 2000.
Although the meteorite is a fragile type called a carbonaceous chondrite, many pieces of it have been remarkably well preserved because they were collected as early as a week after landing on Earth, so did not have much time to weather.
Researchers were excited to find the globules because they could have provided the raw organic chemicals needed for life as well as protective pockets to foster early organisms.
But despite the relatively pristine nature of the meteorite fragments, there was no proof that the globules were originally present in the meteorite, and were not the result of Earthly contamination.
Now, analysis of atomic isotopes shows that the globules could not have come from Earth and must have formed in very cold conditions, possibly before the Sun was born. The research was led by Keiko Nakamura-Messenger of NASA's Johnson Space Centre in Houston, Texas, US.

TagishBubble
Slices through the Tagish Lake meteorite show hollow globules of organic matter, labelled G in these electron microscope images (K Nakamura-Messenger/NASA/JSC)

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Blobrana


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A meteorite that crashed in northwest Canada almost seven years ago might have been able to host the very earliest life forms, according to NASA researchers, which opens the door to the possibility that life could be present elsewhere in the universe.
Mike Zolensky, a cosmic mineralogist at the NASA Space Centre in Texas, told CBC Radio the Tagish Lake meteorite is unlike any they have ever examined.

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Tagish Lake
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Latitude:59.704100°N; Longitude: -134.207477°W

This exceptionally long and bright fireball was seen throughout the Yukon, Northern British Columbia, parts of Alaska, and the Northwest Territories.
Pieces of the 56-metric-ton meteorite rained down over a wide area of Canada on January 18, 2000, at approximately 16:43 UT (08:43 PST local).
Many pieces landed on the frozen Tagish Lake, allowing scientists to recover numerous samples. Studies show that the meteorite is intermediate in composition between the two most primitive groups of chondrite meteorites, CI and CM carbonaceous chondrites. The fireball was seen by many people and also detected by satellites in Earth orbit. Eye witnesses placed the duration of the fireball at about 15 seconds. The Observations of its trajectory allowed scientists to calculate its path through the solar system. The calculations show that it hails from the outer asteroid belt, in a place where dark, carbon- and water-rich asteroids reside. The meteorite is a new type of primitive meteorite that will surely shed light on how the solar system formed.

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Blobrana


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The University of Alberta is welcoming a very, very old rock star into its hallways.

"The Tagish Lake meteorite is the only one of its kind known to exist on Earth, and may contain insights into the beginnings of our solar system" - Dr. Christopher Herd, professor in the University of Alberta Department of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences.

"No other meteorite's ever been collected in this manner and I suppose that arguably makes it the most important rock that's ever been found anywhere on the Earth. It can tell us new information about the birth and evolution of our solar system, and the very fact that it's been kept frozen, essentially pristine, uncontaminated by human hands, gives us an unprecedented opportunity to explore new scientific avenues that were heretofore impossible. We can do things with this meteorite that nobody's ever done before." - Dr. Christopher Herd

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Blobrana


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The University of Alberta, through the Department of Museums and Collections Services and the Department of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences, has led a consortium of partners that have acquired samples of the Tagish Lake Meteorite for mutual research and in order to prevent their export out of Canada. These partners include the Department of Canadian Heritage, the Royal Ontario Museum, Natural Resources Canada, and the Canadian Space Agency.

"What's fascinating about the Tagish Lake Meteorite is that it enables us to probe the farthest reaches of our solar system by studying material that has come to us" - Dr. Christopher Herd, a professor of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences at the University of Alberta.

Dr. Christopher Herd, the Curator of the University of Alberta Meteorite Collection, will lead future research on the University's approximately 650 grams of this unique carbonaceous chondrite.
The study of the meteorite has the potential for revolutionising the understanding of the formation of the solar system 4.57 billion years ago.

The University of Alberta is home to Canada's second-largest meteorite collection. Most recently, Dr. Herd has established a research program in the study of meteorites from Mars; research in meteorites in the collection and others on loan to the University continues to this day.

-- Edited by Blobrana at 02:34, 2006-04-22

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Blobrana


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Yukon Meteor
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Commuters coming into Whitehorse, Yukon, on Thursday morning, saw a meteoroid streaked across the sky.
Witnesses saw a bright fireball streak west to east across the sky just north of the territorial capital at about 8:30 a.m.

"It was blue-white, neon-like and very bright, and lasted about four seconds" - Doris Bill, CBC reporter.

The meteoroid left a grey contrail across the sky that slowly broke up in the upper atmosphere. There were no reports of any sonic boom.
In January of 2000, a 150-tonne meteoroid lit the skies over Whitehorse, and exploded over a lake about 100 kilometres south of the city. The Tagish Lake meteor produced a treasure of information about a rare kind of meteorite.


The largest Tagish Lake stone, originally massing 159 grams, has been broken open to show the gross texture of the meteorite. The right side of the stone shows the fusion crust formed by melting of the surface by friction with the atmosphere as it fell. The cube is 1 cm across.

Thursday's meteoroid likely burned up far above Earth's surface.

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