No abstract

[1] Experiments to investigate the partitioning of oxygen between liquid iron and (Mg,Fe)O magnesiowüstite were conducted at 30-70 GPa and 2800-3500 K using a laser-heated diamond anvil cell. A thin foil was prepared from the reacted regions in the recovered samples using a focused ion beam. The compositions of coexisting quenched iron and magnesiowüstite were measured using a transmission electron microscope equipped with energy dispersive X-ray spectroscopy and electron energy-loss spectroscopy. In order to understand and model the results, additional experiments were performed to determine the activity of oxygen, or rather FeO, in liquid Fe metal. Multianvil experiments to measure the oxygen contents of coexisting immiscible metallic and ionic liquids in the Fe-FeO system were performed up to 25 GPa. The results were used to extract excess mixing properties for Fe-FeO liquids at high pressure and temperature. These properties were used to derive a model that describes oxygen partitioning in the Fe-Mg-O system that is independent of the actual experimental partitioning data. The model indicates that the oxygen content of liquid Fe becomes a strong nonlinear function of the FeO content of magnesiowüstite at pressures greater than 25 GPa. This prediction is in excellent agreement with the experimental partitioning data, which is faithfully reproduced in most instances. The new results confirm that the Earth's core is undersaturated in oxygen with respect to the FeO content of the bulk mantle, which will result either in FeO being depleted from the very base of the mantle or lead to the development of an FeO-enriched outer layer of the core. These possibilities are not mutually exclusive.

No abstract

Heavily shocked meteorites contain various types of high-pressure polymorphs of major minerals (olivine, pyroxene, feldspar, and quartz) and accessory minerals (chromite and Ca phosphate). These high-pressure minerals are micron to submicron sized and occur within and in the vicinity of shock-induced melt veins and melt pockets in chondrites and lunar, howardite-eucrite-diogenite (HED), and Martian meteorites. Their occurrence suggests two types of formation mechanisms (1) solid-state high-pressure transformation of the host-rock minerals into monomineralic polycrystalline aggregates, and (2) crystallization of chondritic or monomineralic melts under high pressure. Based on experimentally determined phase relations, their formation pressures are limited to the pressure range up tõ 25 GPa. Textural, crystallographic, and chemical characteristics of high-pressure minerals provide clues about the impact events of meteorite parent bodies, including their size and mutual collision velocities and about the mineralogy of deep planetary interiors. The aim of this article is to review and summarize the findings on natural high-pressure minerals in shocked meteorites that have been reported over the past 50 years. 2017

Many craters and thick regoliths of the moon imply that it has experienced heavy meteorite bombardments. Although the existence of a high-pressure polymorph is a stark evidence for a dynamic event, few high-pressure polymorphs are found in a lunar sample. a-PbO 2 -type silica (seifertite) is an ultrahigh-pressure polymorph of silica, and is found only in a heavily shocked Martian meteorite. Here we show evidence for seifertite in a shocked lunar meteorite, Northwest Africa 4734. Cristobalite transforms to seifertite by high-pressure and -temperature condition induced by a dynamic event. Considering radio-isotopic ages determined previously, the dynamic event formed seifertite on the moon, accompanying the complete resetting of radio-isotopic ages, is B2.7 Ga ago. Our finding allows us to infer that such intense planetary collisions occurred on the moon until at least B2.7 Ga ago.