One of Earth’s missing minerals found locked inside meteorite
Proposed yet never proven component of crust and mantle found in space debris
The last of a group of dense minerals that make up much of Earth’s crust and upper mantle has been found tucked inside a meteorite that slammed into Australia 135 years ago. The newly discovered mineral, a variety of majorite, is potentially abundant in sinking tectonic plates and could help illuminate the behavior of the deep Earth, its discoverers say.
Each identical component of this mineral contains 32 magnesium atoms, 32 silicon atoms and 96 oxygen atoms arranged in a distorted cube. Natural samples of MgSiO3 tetragonal garnet, the mineral’s scientific moniker, had eluded scientists since the mineral was first artificially produced in 1985.