Current Lab Photo, Allende, Murchison meteorites

February, 2001

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Allende and Murchison

Published images of two of the most notable carbonaceous chondrites

We all know the adage "...there is no time more productive than the 11th hour". Whether it's an Abstract needed to summarize a paper or the final draft for publishing, it's the "11th hour" when it all happens.

1:20 P.M., January 3, 2001.

Discover Magazine called with a request for photo support for an upcoming article by Phillip Bland about carbonaceous chondrites and their (direct?) descendancy from nebular processes. However, Discover only had images of ordinary chondrites, not carbonaceous ones.

"The March issue closes today, could we provide suitable images, via email attachments, in two hours?" !!!!!! That old 11th hour again - for them and us.

We got the job done, emailed the images, and they were used in the March 2001 issue. Unfortunately, Discover Magazine didn't have enough space within the article to present the images to their full resolution - so here they are.

Camera, Nikon D1. Image processing, Adobe Photoshop 6.0. The images are presented in two formats - compressed jpeg and hi-res jpeg. Additionally, super hi-res tif files are available for publications. The hi-res and tif files are large but the resolution detail is well worth the time spent in downloading.

Compressed jpeg, 1.6 kilo, fusion-crusted Allende.

Note the contraction cracks throughout the crust.
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Hi-res jpeg 1.79 meg

Compressed jpeg, 23 gram fragment, Murchison.

Hi-res jpeg 1.6 meg

122 gram, whole specimen, Murchison

Hi-res jpeg 1.05 meg

The Allende and Murchison Falls both produced large amounts >2000 kg and >100 kg respectively of meteorites - carbonaceous chondrites - for study. Allende fell in Chichuahua, Mexico on February 08, 1969 and is classified as a CV3 (Vigarano group, type 3)

Murchison fell on September 28 of the same year, 1969. It is classified as a CM2 (Mighei group, type 2)