‘Mysterious’ meteorite may shed light on explosion of life on Earth

From RT

Researchers have discovered a fossilized space rock that stands out against anything seen before. It may advance the understanding of the asteroid clash that triggered off the diversity boom of life on early Earth.

Most of the meteorites that have fallen to Earth and were found during a 20-year study originate from a huge asteroid that collided with a smaller one – or even a comet – millions of years ago. But before the latest finding by scientists in Sweden nothing was known about the mysterious “bullet” asteroid.

A study by a team of international researchers, prepared for print in the August edition of ‘Earth and Planetary Science Letters’ journal, tells the story of the exploration of a meteorite found in Thorsberg limestone quarry, west of Stockholm, in southern Sweden.

While previous finds have become “quite boring,”according to Birger Schmitz, lead author of the study, who has led the chondrite cataloging, the most recent discovery is “a very, very strange and unusual find.”

Three years ago, while taking part in the industrial process of mining white limestone, used for production of floor plates, for example, the scientists found a gray dissemination in the youngest quarried bed. It was a piece of the ancient wreckage.

Over 100 fossil meteorites have been found in the quarry since the start of the research in 1993. But most interest has centered on the so-called “Mysterious Object.”

“This can give you a ground truth for models for how the solar system may have evolved over time,” said Gary Huss, a co-author of the meteorite study. “I think a lot of people have worried for some time that we don’t really know what’s going on in the asteroid belt.”

About 85 percent of the meteorites raining down on Earth today are ordinary chondrites, and nearly half of those (45 percent) are so-called L-chondrites. Their features show that they are remains of a parent body that clashed with a smaller asteroid in a major space event that happened around 470 million years ago. What marks this breakup is the trace it left in our planet’s geology and biodiversity. Scientists say the destruction caused by the resultant meteor shower led to a burst of new species formation in the early part of the Ordovician period.

David Harper, a geologist at Durham University who did not participate in the study, pointed out that “the team may at last have identified the impactor responsible for the breakup of the parent body of the L-chondrite meteorites.”

Indeed, little was known about the smaller asteroid that caused the collision somewhere between Mars and Jupiter. That is why the Swedish find is crucial for understanding of its origins. Scientists believe their discovery, to which they have given no name so far, calling it just a “Mysterious Object,” was a fragment of the “asteroid destroyer.”

Though their theory is based on analyses of elements, comprising the meteorite, the discovery itself is so little (the meteorite is only 8 cm × 6.5 cm × 2 cm in size), that it could leave a possibility of linking it to known classes of meteorite.

“I think it’s entirely plausible [that it’s a new kind of meteorite], and it’s a great study, but that’s not a guarantee they’ve got it right,” said Tim Swindle, a meteorite expert not involved in the research. “But if they didn’t, it’s because of new things we’ll find out in future work, not because of their analysis.”

PHOTOS:

Image from www.wikipedia.org

A screenshot from the study by B. Schmitz et al. published in ‘Earth and Planetary Science Letters’ (2014). (A) Thorsberg quarry on June 15, 2013. (B) The ‘Mysterious Object’ from the Glaskarten 3 bed.

For more on this story go to: http://rt.com/news/169988-sweden-mysterious-meteorite-earth/

 

Things that delight me over and over!

By Henry S. Fraser From Caribbean360

BRIDGETOWN, Barbados, Sunday June 29, 2014 – In 1949, a splendid little book, Delight, by English author J.B. Priestley, was published, to the delight of thousands of readers. It was described as a collection of short essays on the little things in life that caused even him, a self-confessed old monster, to stop and smile! A few years ago a new and equally whimsical version appeared – Modern Delight by Nick Hornby and others – a collection of the little things that delight a wide range of people. It encouraged me, ever since, to enjoy even more the many things of great beauty and charm that we often take for granted. So this column is, in a way, a personal confessional.

One of my greatest delights at this time is the spectacular carnival of bougainvillea, in every colour, on every corner, around the country. But I’m equally delighted by the sometimes subtle, sometimes dramatic sequence of flowering trees bursting into bloom. This display in our garden usually starts with a few lonely frangipani flowers, and the delicate blue flowers of the lignum vitae. This elegant tree has perhaps the hardest wood in the world and its flower is the national flower of Jamaica. Its reputation for producing abortions (and a haemorrhagic cystitis) allegedly led to a law banning it in Barbados, and so there are only a few really old specimens – the avenues at Harrison College and Queen’s Park House – but happily it’s popular once again, and I have both mature and younger specimens.

The lignum vitae is followed sometime in April / May by our two yellow classics… the poui and the cassia fistula. I planted mine side by side, but they rarely coincide exactly in their proud displays. And then there are the hundreds of flamboyants everywhere (Poincianas in the rest of the Caribbean, named for the Duke de Poince, the seventeenth century French Governor of St. Kitts). Temperature and humidity determine their day of display – April in the drier coastal Christ Church, but not until May or early June on higher ground, in our “mountain districts”!

Other simple delights: the wonderful warm, wet welcome of our many dogs. The affection of the tough “rescue dog” Bruno, the Rottweiler-Mastiff, which I found at the RSPCA. He’s the best of watch dogs, but has a really soft heart for his rescuer, and eyes that would melt the hardest heart. And then there’s my big Dog de Bordeaux; Simba who loves to give paw, and Tiger the Doberman, who can smell a stranger a mile off and barks like mad! What’s great about them all is that the later I come home the happier they are to see me!

And the beauty of trees … in my garden; at Queen’s Park, with our magnificent baobab; at Andromeda; at the Flower Forest; at Welchman Hall; at Bath; those splendid palms along the highway; the spiritual silk cottons and ficuses everywhere. Stand and look up at them at dusk and sense their majesty and the power and beauty and grace of God and all creation.

And the sea – the glorious sea, that most Bajans ignore. Enjoy its calm on a sunny day, when you can float at peace, and enjoy the sense of strength and health as you swim and feel truly part of the universe. And enjoy the energy and beauty of the surf at Accra or the Crane or Bathsheba, our most sacred place in the great cathedral of the Scotland District.

Other simple delights I enjoy every day are the warm and sincere exchanges with people I meet every day. A greeting, a word of “Hello”, “Good morning” or “How are you”; and simply “making four eyes” with the other person is a pleasure for everyone who shares in that way, and a privilege many in this world never have. (And yet how many people move through life with eyes averted, sullen, sad, bored or rude, never caring to share the warmth of a simple greeting.)

And then there are the gastronomic delights, which for some seem to be the only pleasures, creating morbid obesity, illness and early death. I can think of nothing more delightful than Greek yoghurt with honey – one of my few imported favourites, with which I’ve had to replace my favourite Pine Hill yoghurt, now no more; and then there’s my wife’s hot coconut bread and cassava pone – to die for! And as a West Indian, nothing delights more than my first taste of red pea soup and ackee and salt fish whenever I go to Jamaica, or a shrimp roti in Trinidad!

But what is life without love. The delight of sharing with close friends and family is exceeded only by the infinite joy of going to sleep and waking up with the most wonderful wife in the world! Amen!

Brickbat: To FIFA, the World Cup and the entire game of football, which has deteriorated into an aggressive, all-in wrestling match. The fouls that are allowed, the fisticuffs and wrestling, the tripping and the dramatic histrionic displays of pretended injury with instant recovery have made a mockery of the game, formerly known as football and now more correctly designated “Wrestle ball”. I’ve been frankly disgusted by the whole charade. And I condemn equally the local game, where photographs show wrestling players with the caption “fighting for the ball”.

Professor Fraser is past Dean of Medical Sciences, UWI and Professor Emeritus of Medicine. Website: www.profhenryfraser.com

IMAGE: JAMAICA NATIONAL FLOWER, LIGNUM VITAE

For more on this story go to: http://www.caribbean360.com/opinion/henry-s-fraser-things-that-delight-me-over-and-over?utm_source=Caribbean360%20Newsletters&utm_campaign=779d7afa91-Vol_9_Issue_018_Sunday_News6_29_2014&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_350247989a-779d7afa91-39393477