Meteorite may help reveal early conditions on Mars

Mineral map of Miller Range 03346 nakhlite. Image courtesy of Julie D. Stopar et al; click on it to see the full version.

Publishing in Geochimica et Cosmochimica Acta, HIGP researcher Jeff Taylor, Astrobiology post-doctoral fellow Lydia Hallis, and colleagues, report on a tennis ball-sized meteorite that formed on Mars more than a billion years ago. Lead author Julie Stopar (Arizona State University) is a former SOEST graduate student and earned her M.S. degree with Jeff Taylor. They report on chemical alteration in the Martian meteorite, and present criteria to distinguish between weathering that occurred on Mars from weathering that happened after the rock landed in Antarctica. Also on the paper are Michael Velbel (Michigan State University), Marc Norman (Australian National University), and Edward Vicenzi (Smithsonian Institution).
Read more about it in MSU Today.