A new astrophysical setting for chondrule formation

An evolutionary system of mineralogy. Part III: Primary chondrule mineralogy (4566 to 4561 Ma)

Information-rich attributes of minerals reveal their physical, chemical, and biological modes of origin in the context of planetary evolution, and thus they provide the basis for an evolutionary system of mineralogy. Part III of this system considers the formation of 43 different primary crystalline and amorphous phases in chondrules, which are diverse igneous droplets that formed in environments with high dust/gas ratios during an interval of planetesimal accretion and differentiation between 4566 and 4561 Ma. Chondrule mineralogy is complex, with several generations of initial droplet formation via various proposed heating mechanisms, followed in many instances by multiple episodes of reheating and partial melting. Primary chondrule mineralogy thus reflects a dynamic stage of mineral evolution, when the diversity and distribution of natural condensed solids expanded significantly.

Thermal History of CBb Chondrules and Cooling Rate Distributions of Ejecta Plumes

It has been proposed that some meteorites, CB and CH chondrites, contain material formed as a result of a protoplanetary collision during accretion. Their melt droplets (chondrules) and FeNi metal are proposed to have formed by evaporation and condensation in the resulting impact plume. We observe that the skeletal olivine (SO) chondrules in CBb chondrites have a blebby texture and an enrichment in refractory elements not found in normal chondrules. Because the texture requires complete melting, their maximum liquidus temperature of 1928 K represents a minimum temperature for the putative plume. Dynamic crystallization experiments show that the SO texture can be created only by brief reheating episodes during crystallization, giving a partial dissolution of olivine. The ejecta plume formed in a smoothed particle hydrodynamics simulation served as the basis for 3D modeling with the adaptive mesh refinement code FLASH4.3. Tracer particles that move with the fluid cells are used to measure the in situ cooling rates. Their cooling rates are ~10,000 K hr-1 briefly at peak temperature and, in the densest regions of the plume, ~100 K hr-1 for 1400-1600 K. A small fraction of cells is seen to be heating at any one time, with heating spikes explained by the compression of parcels of gas in a heterogeneous patchy plume. These temperature fluctuations are comparable to those required in crystallization experiments. For the first time, we find an agreement between experiments and models that supports the plume model specifically for the formation of CBb chondrules.

Young chondrules in CB chondrites from a giant impact in the early Solar System

Chondrules, which are the major constituent of chondritic meteorites, are believed to have formed during brief, localized, repetitive melting of dust (probably caused by shock waves) in the protoplanetary disk around the early Sun. The ages of primitive chondrules in chondritic meteorites indicate that their formation started shortly after that of the calcium-aluminium-rich inclusions (4,567.2 +/- 0.7 Myr ago) and lasted for about 3 Myr, which is consistent with the dissipation timescale for protoplanetary disks around young solar-mass stars. Here we report the 207Pb-206Pb ages of chondrules in the metal-rich CB (Bencubbin-like) carbonaceous chondrites Gujba (4,562.7 +/- 0.5 Myr) and Hammadah al Hamra 237 (4,562.8 +/- 0.9 Myr), which formed during a single-stage, highly energetic event. Both the relatively young ages and the single-stage formation of the CB chondrules are inconsistent with formation during a nebular shock wave. We conclude that chondrules and metal grains in the CB chondrites formed from a vapour-melt plume produced by a giant impact between planetary embryos after dust in the protoplanetary disk had largely dissipated. These findings therefore provide evidence for planet-sized objects in the earliest asteroid belt, as required by current numerical simulations of planet formation in the inner Solar System.

Mass-independent isotope effect in the earliest processed solids in the solar system: A possible chemical mechanism

A major constraint is described for a possible chemical origin for the "mass-independent" oxygen isotope phenomenon in calcium-aluminum rich inclusions (CAIs) in meteorites at high temperatures ( approximately 1500-2000 K). A symmetry-based dynamical eta effect is postulated for O atom-monoxide recombination on the surface of growing CAIs. It is the surface analog of the volume-based eta effect occurring in a similar phenomenon for ozone in the gas phase [Y. Q. Gao, W. C. Chen, and R. A. Marcus, J. Chem. Phys. 117, 1536 (2002), and references cited therein]: In the growth of CAI grains an equilibrium is postulated between adsorbed species XO (ads)+O (ads) <==>XO*(2)(ads), where XO*(2)(ads) is a vibrationally excited adsorbed dioxide molecule and X can be Si, Al, Ti, or other metals and can be C for minerals less refractory than the CAIs. The surface of a growing grain has an entropic effect of many order of magnitude on the position of this monoxide-dioxide equilibrium relative to its volume-based position by acting as a concentrator. The volume-based eta effect for ozone in the earlier study is not applicable to gas phase precursors of CAIs, due to the rarity of three-body recombination collisions at very low pressures and because of the high H(2) and H concentration in solar gas, which reduces gaseous O and gaseous dioxides and prevents the latter from acting as storage reservoirs for the two heavier oxygen isotopes. A surface eta effect yields XO*(2)(ads) that is mass-independently rich in (17)O and (18)O, and yields XO (ads)+O (ads) that is mass-independently poor in the two heavier oxygen isotopes. When the XO*(2)(ads) is deactivated by vibrational energy loss to the grain, it has only one subsequent fate, evaporation, and so undergoes no further isotopic fractionation. After evaporation the XO(2) again has only one fate, which is to react rapidly with H and ultimately form (16)O-poor H(2)O. The other species, O (ads)+XO (ads), are (16)O rich and react with Ca (ads) and other adsorbed metal atoms or metallic monoxides to form CAIs. The latter are thereby mass-independently poor in (17)O and (18)O. Some O (ads) used to form the minerals are necessarily in excess of the XO (ads), because of the stoichiometry of the mineral, and modify the fractionation pattern. This effect is incorporated into the mechanistic and mathematical scheme. A merit of this chemical mechanism for the oxygen isotope anomaly is that only one oxygen reservoir is required in the solar nebula. It also does not require a sequestering of intermediate products which could undergo isotopic exchange, hence undoing the original isotopic fractionations. The gas phase source of adsorbed O atoms in this environment is either O or H(2)O. As inferred from data on the evaporation of Mg(2)SiO(4) taken as an example, the source of O (ads) is primarily H(2)O rather than O and is accompanied by the evolution of H(2). Nonisotopic kinetic experiments can determine more sharply the mechanism of condensed phase growth of these minerals. Laboratory tests are proposed to test the existence of a surface eta effect on the growing CAI surfaces at these high temperatures.