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Oxygen isotope composition of meteoritic ablation debris from the Transantarctic Mountains: Constraining the parent body and implications for the impact scenario
Author(s) -
Van GINNEKEN M.,
SUAVET C.,
CORDIER C.,
FOLCO L.,
ROCHETTE P.,
SONZOGNI C.,
PERCHIAZZI N.
Publication year - 2012
Publication title -
meteoritics and planetary science
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.09
H-Index - 100
eISSN - 1945-5100
pISSN - 1086-9379
DOI - 10.1111/maps.12011
Subject(s) - astrobiology , isotopes of oxygen , dome (geology) , geology , comet , debris , asteroid , chondrite , meteorite , ice core , snowball earth , composition (language) , parent body , geochemistry , geomorphology , physics , glacial period , oceanography , linguistics , philosophy
– Microscopic meteoritic ablation spheres recently found on top of the Victoria Land in Transantarctic Mountains, and in the L2 Dome C and DF2691 Dome Fuji ice core layers document a major impact of a 10 8 kg (or larger) cosmic body in the Antarctic region about 480 kyr ago. Although of broadly chondritic composition, the exact nature of the impactor is unknown, and whether the impactor struck the Antarctic ice sheet or exploded in the atmosphere is a matter of debate. Based on oxygen isotope analyses of ablation spheres from the Transantarctic Mountains by means of IR‐laser fluorination coupled with mass spectrometry, we suggest that they represent the debris of an atmospheric airburst of a primitive asteroid of CV, CO, or CK composition, or a comet with composition similar to the short‐period comet 81P/Wild 2.