Ureilite Thin Section

This is a view of a part of a thin section from a hot desert meteorite find called NWA 5555. The NWA stands for North West Africa. The meteorite market has been flooded with thousands of finds from the deserts of Africa. This has allowed ordinary collectors like me to buy stuff that just wasn't avalible back in the mid 1990's.

 

This type of meteorite is called an ureilite and is a type of meteorite known as an achondrite ie without chondrules. The origin of this type is not well understood. The original parent body did melt creating the colorful crystals seen above. At some point a matrix of graphite and diamond rich material was injected into the rock giving all the dark veins running between the crystals. Ureilites are really ugly meteorites in bulk, but in thin section they are very beautiful.

 

I've heard that thin section makers hate ureilites since the diamonds in the matrix really make it hard to polish using the normal diamond laps.

 

This is a panorama of about 20 pictures taken through an Olympus microscope.

 

Cheers.

Done