Abstract
Lunar soil preserves numerous fragments of meteorites impacting on the Moon,providing a unique opportunity to investigate the distribution of the types of projectiles over billions of years.Here we report the first discovery of an iron meteorite fragment from the Chang'e-5 lunar soil,which consists mainly of martensite(quenched from taenite),kamacite,and schreibersite,with a trace of pentlandite.The mete-orite fragment is Ni-and P-rich,S-poor,and based on its mineral chemistry and bulk composition,can be classified into the ⅡD-group,a rare and carbonaceous group of iron meteorite originating in the outer Solar System.This meteorite fragment experienced only limited partial melting followed by fast cooling,suggestive of efficient preservation of intact remnants of iron meteorites impacting on the porous lunar regolith.Alternatively,it is a relic of a low-velocity impact of submillimeter-sized metal grains originated from an ⅡD-Iike iron meteorite.Our observations demonstrate that it is feasible to achieve the type dis-tribution of meteorites impacting on the Moon via systematically analyzing a large number of metal grains separated from lunar soils,thus shedding light on the dynamic evolution of the Solar System.
基金项目
National Natural Science Foundation of China(42230206)
National Natural Science Foundation of China(42241152)
National Natural Science Foundation of China(42103035)
Key Research Program of Frontier Sciences,Chinese Academy of Sciences(QYZDJ-SSW-DQC001)
Institute of Geology and Geophysics,Chinese Academy of Sciences(IGGCAS)()
NETL
NSTL
万方数据