Murchison meteorite

 

Large individual of the Murchison Meteorite with fusion crust. Field Museum of Natural History meteorite collection, Chicago, Illinois, USA. Credit: James St. John

The Murchison meteorite, one of the most studied of all meteorites, that belongs to the CM2 group of carbonaceous chondrites, fell in Australia on September 28, 1969. At approximately 10:58 a.m. local time, near Murchison, Victoria, a bright fireball was observed to separate into three fragments before disappearing, leaving a cloud of smoke. About 30 seconds later, a tremor was heard. Many fragments were found scattered over an area larger than 13 square kilometres, with individual mass up to 7 kilograms; one, weighing 680 grams, broke through a roof and fell in hay. The total collected mass of the meteorite exceeds 100 kilograms. Samples were quickly recovered to minimize contamination with Earth materials. 

   Several lines of evidence indicate that the interior portions of well-preserved fragments from Murchison are pristine. The meteorite is rich in amino acids and other organic compounds. A 2010 study using high resolution analytical tools including spectroscopy, identified 14,000 molecular compounds, including 70 amino acids, in a sample of the meteorite. The limited scope of the analysis by mass spectrometry provides for a potential 50,000 or more unique molecular compositions, with the team estimating the possibility of millions of distinct organic structures in the meteorite. These results suggest that the extraterrestrial chemical diversity is high compared to terrestrial biological and biogeochemical spaces.

   In January 2020, cosmochemists reported that Murchison meteorite silicon carbide particles had been determined to be 7 billion years old, 2.5 billion years older than the 4.54 billion years age of the Earth and the Solar System, and the oldest material found on Earth to date. 

The fragment of the Murchison Meteorite weighing 0.459 grams. Credit: Jon Taylor 

 Murchison meteorite at the The National Museum of Natural History in Washington. 
 Credit: User Basilicofresco on Wukimedia Commons
 
 

References:

Matson, John. "Meteorite That Fell in 1969 Still Revealing Secrets of the Early Solar System". Scientific American, February 15, 2010
Schmitt-Kopplin, Philippe et al. "High molecular diversity of extraterrestrial organic matter in Murchison meteorite revealed 40 years after its fall" (PDF). PNAS. 107 (7): 2763–2768. 16 February 2010. doi:10.1073/pnas.0912157107
Heck, Philipp R. et al. "Lifetimes of interstellar dust from cosmic ray exposure ages of presolar silicon carbide". PNAS. 117 (4): 1884–1889. 13 January 2020. doi:10.1073/pnas.1904573117

 

© 2025, Andrew Mirecki 

 


 

 
 

 

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