Introduction: The lunar mare basalts potentially provide a unique sample suite for understanding the nature of basalts on the martian surface. Our current knowledge of the mineralogical and chemical composition of the basaltic material on Mars comes from studies of the basaltic martian meteorites and from orbital and surface remote sensing observations. Petrographic observations of basaltic mar...

All the shergottite meteorites display intense shock metamorphisms. Especially, plagioclase shows a characteristic shock feature: formation of diaplectic glass (maskelynite) or melting (Duke, 1968; McSween and Stoffler, 1980; McSween and Jarosewich, 1983). By studying the shergottite meteorites, we can get a better understanding of the nature of shock metamorphism of olivine, in comparison with...

Introduction: Reflectivity spectra of Martian bright regions and laboratory experiments on synthetic glasses have indicated the presence of glass on the surface of Mars [1-3]. Glass formation on Mars can be from both volcanic and impact processes. Because of the broad nature of the reflectance bands, the exact composition and amount of glass on the surface of Mars is still a subject of discussi...

Introduction: The crystallization age of Zagami has been well established by the Rb-Sr and Sm-Nd isochron techniques. Isotopic analysis on purified mineral fractions yield Rb-Sr ages of 178±3, 174±14, and 163±19 Ma [1-2], and a Sm-Nd age of 163±7 Ma [2]. Whole rock and leachate pairs have also been analyzed for U-Th-Pb isotopes and yield a Th-Pb age of 230±5 Ma and a U-Pb age of 229±8 Ma [3]. C...

To demonstrate the ability of Raman spectroscopy to determine the mineralogical character of a rock that originated on Mars, we analyzed a small slab of “normal Zagami” by point analyses and multipoint scans using laboratory spectrometers. Spectra of clinopyroxenes were dominant; their compositions were estimated from a calibration of Raman peak positions with Mg/(Mg+Fe) based on lunar pyroxene...

Introduction: The shergottite basalts, meteorites of Martian origin, contain rare small grains (~10-100 μm diam.) of kaersutite, a Ca-amphibole rich in Al and Ti [1-3]. Kaersutites have been used to estimate the water content of shergottites and the Martian mantle [4]; however, questions remain about the original water content of the amphiboles [5] and if they formed from magma [6]. We investig...

Introduction: Recently, a lot of basaltic shergottites have been found from the desert areas in northern Africa and Middle East Asia. Most of them contain large olivine grains that are not present in the previously known basaltic shergottites (except for EETA79001). These olivine grains are mostly Mg-rich, but they show different mineralogical features in each meteorite. Dar al Gani 476 and its...

Hugoniot data for oligoclase and microcline to 670 and 580 kb and release adiabat data for oligoclase were obtained by means of the inclined mirror and immersed-foil-reflected-light techniques, respectively. Oligoclase and microcline have Hugoniot elastic limits in the range of 40-55 and 80-85 kb. These limits increase slightly with increasing driving shock pressure. Above the elastic limit, ex...