Vesicular parachutes increase the abundance of micrometeorites from water-rich asteroids on Earth
File(s)Genge-2017-Geophysical_Research_Letters.pdf (1.96 MB)
Published version
Author(s)
Genge, MJ
Type
Journal Article
Abstract
Micrometeorites (MMs) are extraterrestrial dust particles that survive atmospheric entry and can be recovered from sedimentary rocks. Fossil MMs allow events beyond the Earth, such as the collisional breakup of asteroids, to be identified. Here the effects of vesicle formation during melting of dust are investigated through numerical modeling and observations of Antarctic MMs. Vesicle formation is shown to cause a parachute effect that causes rapid deceleration, decreasing peak temperature. Vesicular parachuting enhances the abundance of melted MMs formed from phyllosilicate-bearing C-type asteroid dust on the Earth surface by a factor of 2. Micrometeorites recovered from the geological record, therefore, are biased toward breakup events involving hydrated C-type asteroids, whilst those involving phyllosilicate-poor particles are diluted by the enhanced background flux of hydrous dust. The parachute effect is also likely to increase the delivery of 3He to ocean sediments by C-type asteroid dust.
Date Issued
2017-02-14
Date Acceptance
2017-02-14
Citation
Geophysical Research Letters, 2017, 44
ISSN
1944-8007
Publisher
American Geophysical Union (AGU)
Journal / Book Title
Geophysical Research Letters
Volume
44
Copyright Statement
© 2017. The Authors.This is an open access article under theterms of the Creative CommonsAttribution License, which permits use,distribution and reproduction in anymedium, provided the original work isproperly cited.
Sponsor
Science and Technology Facilities Council (STFC)
Grant Number
ST/N000803/1
Subjects
MD Multidisciplinary
Publication Status
Published