Encyclopedia of Scientific Dating Methods

Living Edition
| Editors: W. Jack Rink, Jeroen Thompson

Meteorites (36Cl)

  • Kees Welten
Living reference work entry
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-6326-5_164-1
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Definition

Cosmogenic nuclide: A stable or radioactive isotope that is produced by the interaction of terrestrial or extraterrestrial materials with galactic and/or solar cosmic rays.

Meteorites: An extraterrestrial rock or iron that survived passage through the atmosphere and landed on Earth. Most meteorites are pieces of collisional debris from asteroids or comets, although a small percentage are fragments of the moon and Mars.

Introduction

Cosmogenic nuclides provide information on a meteorite’s history, specifically during their travel through space as meter-sized objects, in which they were exposed to cosmic rays. More than 50 different cosmogenic nuclides have been detected in meteorites, including the stable isotopes of the noble gases, He, Ne, Ar, Kr, and Xe, and radioactive nuclides with half-lives ranging from less than 1 day ( 24Na) to 1.28 Ga ( 40K). The measured concentrations of cosmogenic nuclides in meteorites provide information on the total exposure time of meteorites...

Keywords

Accelerator Mass Spectrometry Iron Meteorite 10Be Concentration Cosmogenic Nuclide Cosmogenic Radionuclide 
These keywords were added by machine and not by the authors. This process is experimental and the keywords may be updated as the learning algorithm improves.
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© Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht 2014

Authors and Affiliations

  1. 1.Space Sciences LaboratoryUniversity of CaliforniaBerkeleyUSA