Lunar meteorite (feldspathic breccia)
Sahara Desert, North West Africa
Lunar meteorites arrive on Earth as a result of having been ejected off the lunar surface by asteroid impacts. Scientists are readily able to identify Moon rocks by analyzing a rock's texture, mineralogy, chemistry and isotopes. Moon rocks also contain gases from the solar wind, and those gases have markedly different isotope ratios depending upon a terrestrial or lunar origin. This chunk of the Moon is a breccia, which means it’s a lot of different fragments of a lot of different things which were 'cemented' together as a result of pressure and heat. The white mineral is anorthite, which is very rare on Earth but not on the Moon. The scientist who did the analysis, Dr. Anthony Irving, is internationally renowned for classifying Martian and lunar meteorites. This triangular specimen is cut on four surfaces with a natural surface on one face. This wedge is the result of creating a polyhedral blank in the preparation of a large sphere. One would expect some of the Moon rocks that Apollo missions returned to Earth to strongly resemble lunar meteorites—and that is exactly the case with this specimen—an engaging, pocket-sized sample of the Moon.
40 x 23 x 12 mm and 13.85 grams.
A copy of the scientific analysis and classification of NWA 12691 accompanies this sample.
Provenance: The Stifler Collection of Meteorites.
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