Water can come to earth from meteorites, say scientists

Meteorites may have brought water to Earth from the Outer Solar System through a 4.5 billion year history – and they may still be doing so.

That is the recommendation of a new paper published in Science, the academic journal of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

Meteorites may not have watered Earth early in its history is a highly controversial claim, but this new research suggests that the process could be ongoing rather than halting billions of years on. back.

The researchers studied carbonaceous chondrite meteorites, remaining building blocks of the Solar System, and found that liquid had flowed over them in the past million years.

Carbonaceous chondrite meteorites from ancient parent groups move in the outer Solar System beyond the Jupiter orbit, which has been virtually undisturbed since its creation.

The scientists – led by Simon Turner at Macquarie University in Sydney, Australia – studied carbonaceous chondrite meteorites collected from around the world.

To detect signs of melting current they recently tested for uranium and thorium isotopes. Why? Because uranium is soluble in water, it can be transported by lifts, but it decomposes to radioactive to thorium, which is immobilized. Their signature should disappear within a million years, due to the decline of radioactivity, but that was not the case on some dragons.

Their conclusion is that there is still water or methane in the parent groups of meteorites that are out in the Solar System, probably because ice was melting in the parent groups during the accidents that broke the meteorites. .

That then suggests that the meteorites may have been delivering water to Earth through the history of our planet.

Wishing you clear skies and wide eyes.