Interstallar meteorites

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divee
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Interstallar meteorites

Post by divee »

Is there any calculation about how many of the meteorites which landed on our planet are of interstellar origin?
The universe is big enough
Groundling
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Meterorites

Post by Groundling »

Hi divee;
My brain just imploded. :shock:
Groundling
I have met the enemy and he is us.
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divee
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Post by divee »

I hope your brains wil recover Groundling.:)
But this subject is really intresting me so this forum should be a nice place to hear something about the subject I hope.;)
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fjgiie
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Links of interest

Post by fjgiie »

http://adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/1997JRASC..91...68H IS meteorites?
http://articles.adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi- ... ..91...68H same paper
http://www.lpi.usra.edu/meetings/metsoc ... f/5214.pdf exchange between stellar systems
http://www.lpl.arizona.edu/~jmelosh/Int ... permia.pdf
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=In ... gle+Search Many more

[edit] To divee: There are hints in some of the above that we are looking for the only IS meteorites with our search for IS dust tracks in Stardust at home. [/edit]
Last edited by fjgiie on Wed Nov 08, 2006 11:22 am, edited 1 time in total.
divee
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Post by divee »

Thank you fjgiie.
I will read them with great intrest!
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sb126k
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Post by sb126k »

What those links will tell you is that, of all the meteorites that have landed on Earth, none are interstellar. The short reason for this is that all the other planets and their gravity act as bouncers for the meteors coming into the system, because their gravity grabs the meteors and changes their direction, as does the moon, not to mention the sun. The other thing is that all the other star system are so far away that IS meteors take a very long time to get here, on top of the fact that they probobly won't get through to us. The chances of an IS object overcoming that is huge, which is why no IS objects have hit Earth. Yet.
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divee
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Post by divee »

What I read in there is that nobody found even the smallest one. For obvious reasons. I know that the chances are extremely rare but not zero.
I think of stars passing the sun relatively close in the past so that the oortclouds interacted and messed up. Perhaps even a few were captured by the suns gravity.
Also if you look at what we know at this moment from planet formation and the chaotic way this happens there ought to be zillions of rocky and icy bits thrown out of their system. This proces is going on from the early days of the universe. In time things are mixed up so to speak.
My question is about chance really. How big that chance is.
Ofcorse heavy bodies catch more stuf than less heavy bodies due to there stronger gravity.gravity.
I am not talking about huge objects btw but any object even if it is microscopic.
We all are searching now for this particles with Stardust. Stardust captures these particles in[!] our solar system.
Sure all the bodies with significant gravity in the solar system act like bouncers and catchers. Sometimes stuff is directly directed to earth.
In fact you cannot know at this moment if an IS hit earth I think.
The universe is big enough
GelDelve

Post by GelDelve »

divee,

Your comments, I think, are essentially true.

In point of fact, nearly all the materials that make up our solar system with the possible exception of hydrogen, came from other stars. That's because the universe was essentially hydrogen before any stars were born. If not for stars and supernovas, we would not have any of the elements heavier than hydrogen and possibly some helium.

Of course, since a meteorite by definition is large enough to actually reach the earth's surface without being burning up in the atmosphere, none of the interstellar dust in the collector is a meteorite, nor would such interstellar dust particles actually reach the earth in their original form. They would disintegrate first into completely different molecules or otherwise altered forms. But I think you are correct in saying that we cannot know if interstellar material has hit the earth for two reasons: 1) We may not have ever found one, even if there are several buried in the earth or even lying on the surface somewhere, and 2) We might not know what to look for even if we have found one.

Based on what the scientists are defining as interstellar material entering our solar system, I think they are talking about newer dust that was not part of the matter that originally formed our solar system.

That's my two cents worth of conjecture, anyway! :roll:
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