from Part III - Mineralogy and Remote Sensing of Rocks, Soil, Dust, and Ices
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 10 December 2009
ABSTRACT
Times of impact ejection of Martian meteorites occur in clusters and correlate with petrographic classifications. The clustered or unique ejection ages apparently sample as many as seven distinct locations on Mars. All these sites, as yet not identified unambiguously, are dominated by basaltic flows or cumulate rocks formed from basaltic magmas. Except for ALH 84001, a 4.5 Ga sample of the Noachian crust, all SNCs were extracted from Amazonian volcanic terrains. Lithologies identified by landed or orbiting spacecraft are generally different from SNCs, although the distinctive mineralogic characteristics of SNCs (ferroan olivine and pyroxenes, sodic plagioclase) are commonly indicated by remote-sensing data. Aqueous alteration of SNC meteorites is limited, and light stable isotopic fractionations suggest hydrologic cycling. These meteorites reveal many geochemical, mineralogical, and chronological properties of the crust that cannot yet be measured by remote sensing.
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