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  4. Unique large diamonds in a ureilite from Almahata Sitta 2008 TC3 asteroid
 
research article

Unique large diamonds in a ureilite from Almahata Sitta 2008 TC3 asteroid

Miyahara, Masaaki
•
Ohtani, Eiji
•
El Goresy, Ahmed
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2015
Geochimica Et Cosmochimica Acta

The Almahata Sitta MS-170 ureilite (a piece of a breccia originating from the asteroid, 2008 TC3) consists mainly of olivine, with many diamond and graphite grains existing between the olivine grains. The occurrences of the diamonds are unique; i.e., (i) some diamonds exhibit sub-euhedral habits and (ii) some diamonds have large grain-size (up to about 40 mu m). Several diamonds are segmented into many fragments by fractures. Individual fragments have similar crystallographic orientation, which implies that the adjacent diamond segments were originally a single crystal. Large diamond assemblages occur besides such individual diamond grains. In one of the largest assemblages (almost about 100 mu m in size) has also the same crystallographic orientation. They can be regarded as the pieces of a previously unique single diamond, which provides evidence for large single-crystals diamond in meteorites. Almahata Sitta MS-170 is a meteorite fragment from the 2008 TC3 asteroid that underwent less shock than other ureilitic meteorites. It is unlikely that such large diamonds were formed from graphite through a shock-induced phase transformation during planetesimal collision, despite this idea being now widely accepted as the diamond formation mechanism of ureilites. Fine-scale heterogeneous distribution of impurities (hydrogen, nitrogen, and oxygen) exists in single crystal diamonds, indicative of sluggish growth. This distribution is reminiscent of sector zoning growth. Its grain size, the shock features of MS-170, and the C- and N-isotopic composition signatures allow us to revive classical and but not widely accepted models for diamond formation in ureilites; i.e., a diamond formed from partially melted magma or a C-O-H fluid in the deep interior of the ureilite parent-body or, alternatively, through a chemical vapor deposition (CVD) process in the solar nebula. Considering present mineralogical and isotopic features, the former scenario is more favorable. (C) 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

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Type
research article
DOI
10.1016/j.gca.2015.04.035
Web of Science ID

WOS:000355926900002

Author(s)
Miyahara, Masaaki
Ohtani, Eiji
El Goresy, Ahmed
Lin, Yangting
Feng, Lu
Zhang, Jian-Chao
Gillet, Philippe  
Nagase, Toshiro
Muto, Jun
Nishijima, Masahiko
Date Issued

2015

Publisher

Pergamon-Elsevier Science Ltd

Published in
Geochimica Et Cosmochimica Acta
Volume

163

Start page

14

End page

26

Editorial or Peer reviewed

REVIEWED

Written at

EPFL

EPFL units
EPSL  
Available on Infoscience
September 28, 2015
Use this identifier to reference this record
https://infoscience.epfl.ch/handle/20.500.14299/118783
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