More Evidence for Multiple Meteorite Magmas

Cosmochemists have identified six main compositional types of magma that formed inside asteroids during the first 100 million years of Solar System history. These magmas vary in their chemical and mineralogical make up, but all have in common low concentrations of sodium and other volatile elements. Our low-sodium-magma diet has now changed. Two groups of researchers have identified a new type of asteroidal magma that is rich in sodium and appears to have formed by partial melting of previously unmelted, volatile-rich chondritic rock. The teams, one led by James Day (University of Maryland) and the other by Chip Shearer (University of New Mexico), studied two meteorites found in Antarctica, named Graves Nunatak 06128 and 06129, using a battery of cosmochemical techniques. These studies show that an even wider variety of magmas was produced inside asteroids than we had thought, shedding light on the melting histories and formation of asteroids.