QUE 97053 is basaltic
eucrite that formed in volcanic flows on the surface of Vesta some 4.4-4.5 billion years ago.
Meanwhile, somewhere out there, Vesta is still orbiting the far edges of our solar system, and an undergraduate is looking up the word "
eucrite."
Hayasaka [12] suggested that the cumulate metagabbro (pyroxenite, anorthosite, and
eucrite) in the Asago area is rather similar in petrography and geochemistry to those in the Oshima peninsula and Ayabe areas (Figure 1), thus suggesting that this metagabbro originated from a lower crustal section of oceanic crust and was derived from the T-type MORB source (i.e., OB ophiolite) (Figure 2(a)).
In particular, howardite and
eucrite meteorites, which are common species found on Earth, have been used to study asteroid Vesta, their parent body.
The new findings solidly confirm the connection between Vesta and a class of meteorites found on Earth called the Howardite,
Eucrite and Diogenite meteorites, which have the same ratios for these elements.
Although Vesta and its family are located between Mars and Jupiter, smaller pieces of these asteroids can be found in meteorite collections on Earth, including most
eucrite, howardite and diogenite meteorites.
This one, too, resembles a
eucrite, but its ratio of iron to manganese resembles that of other lunar rock types, notes Keizo Yanai of the Institute of Polar Research in Tokyo.
This basin appears to have excavated into the mantle of Vesta, exposing material spectrally similar to diogenite meteorites; Vesta's crust is spectrally similar to
eucrite and howardite meteorites, thus confirming that Vesta and its family of asteroids are the source of the howardite-eucrite-diogenite (HED) family of basaltic achondrite meteorites.
These basaltic meteorites from 4-Vesta are known as
eucrites and carry a unique signature of one of the oldest hydrogen reservoirs in the solar system.
The rock belongs to a group of meteorites known as
eucrites and considered to be fragments chipped from the giant asteroid 4 Vesta.
Scientists noticed that Vesta's infrared spectrum is remarkably similar to the spectra of a class of meteorites called the HEDs (Howardites,
Eucrites, and Diogenites), ancient samples of which apparently started out as volcanic rocks within the crust or mantle of a large terrestrial planet or protoplanet and that were later transported to Earth by impacts.