The Organic Content of the Tagish Lake Meteorite
Sandra Pizzarello,1
Yongsong Huang,2
Luann Becker,3
Robert J. Poreda,4
Ronald A. Nieman,1
George Cooper,5
Michael Williams1
The Tagish Lake meteorite fell last year on a frozen lake in Canada
and may provide the most pristine material of its kind. Analyses have
now shown this carbonaceous chondrite to contain a suite of soluble
organic compounds (~100 parts per million) that includes mono- and
dicarboxylic acids, dicarboximides, pyridine carboxylic acids, a
sulfonic acid, and both aliphatic and aromatic hydrocarbons. The
insoluble carbon exhibits exclusive aromatic character, deuterium
enrichment, and fullerenes containing "planetary" helium and argon.
The findings provide insight into an outcome of early solar chemical
evolution that differs from any seen so far in meteorites.
1 Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry,
Arizona State University, Tempe, AZ 85287, USA.
2 Department of Geological Sciences, Brown
University, Providence, RI 02912, USA.
3 Institute
of Crustal Studies, University of California at Santa Barbara, Santa
Barbara, CA 93106, USA.
4 Department of Earth and
Environmental Sciences, University of Rochester, Rochester, NY 14627, USA.
5 NASA Ames Research Center, Moffet Field, CA
94035, USA.
