Space diamonds on Earth prove existence of lost planet from solar system’s chaotic early days
The tiny gems they were discovered inside a small asteroid that slammed into the atmosphere over the Nubian Desert in northeastern Sudan in October 2008
Scientists have found the first hard evidence of a large and ancient protoplanet embedded in extraterrestrial diamonds that fell to Earth about 10 years ago.
To be clear, the diamonds did not fall to Earth on their own. Instead, they were discovered inside a small asteroid that slammed into the atmosphere over the Nubian Desert in northeastern Sudan in October 2008.
And in case you are imagining large twinkling space gems, let’s also be clear that these diamonds are extremely tiny – the biggest are about the width of a human hair.
And yet, in a paper published Tuesday in Nature Communications, researchers say that within these small diamonds are chemical clues that suggest they could only have formed deep within a Mercury- or Mars-sized almost-planet that formed in the chaotic early days of the solar system.
“What makes this study so exciting is that it is direct evidence from an actual rock that there was a large protoplanetary body that is no longer around,” said Meenakshi Wadhwa, who studies meteorites at Arizona State University and who was not involved in the new work.
“That is pretty exciting,” she added.