Meteorite Found in Sahara Desert is Rosetta Stone for Mars
When a rose-colored meteorite was found in the Sahara Desert in 2022, no one knew how old it was or where it came from.
Now, NASA-funded scientists have age-dated its minerals and discovered that the nearly 2-pound (800-gram) rock was a piece of Mars that formed more than 4.1 billion years ago, making it one of the oldest Martian meteorites ever found. It's called Teghaza 001 after the salt plain in Mali where it was discovered.
“It was only after we started looking closely that we realized this meteorite is really unique,” said the paper’s lead author, Yang Liu of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California. “One of the paper’s reviewers called it a Rosetta Stone for Mars.”
What sets Teghaza 001 apart from other Martian meteorites is its texture and age as well as the uniqueness of its igneous, or volcanic, minerals. It is one of the three most ancient Martian meteorites found on Earth.
In a new paper, researchers offered an initial characterization of Teghaza 001, providing a rare snapshot of Mars’ ancient crust and formation. What scientists learn from future studies could help answer many questions, including how water and rocks interacted on ancient Mars. A separate paper published in Science Advances in June detailed the meteorite’s water content, offering a look at how water shaped the early planet’s surface.
Unlike its ancient peers, Teghaza 001 has a mix of igneous minerals that tells a story about how the planet’s crust formed from cooling magma before it was eventually altered by subsurface water.
This year’s papers are just the start. Liu and her co-authors are eager to see what the rest of the scientific community can learn from Teghaza 001, saying “We’ve only scratched the surface.”
