Discovery of seifertite in a shocked lunar meteorite

Masaaki Miyahara (), Shohei Kaneko, Eiji Ohtani, Takeshi Sakai, Toshiro Nagase, Masahiro Kayama, Hirotsugu Nishido and Naohisa Hirao
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Masaaki Miyahara: Institute of Mineralogy, Petrology and Economic Geology, Graduate School of Science, Tohoku University
Shohei Kaneko: Institute of Mineralogy, Petrology and Economic Geology, Graduate School of Science, Tohoku University
Eiji Ohtani: Institute of Mineralogy, Petrology and Economic Geology, Graduate School of Science, Tohoku University
Takeshi Sakai: Institute of Mineralogy, Petrology and Economic Geology, Graduate School of Science, Tohoku University
Toshiro Nagase: Center for Academic Resources and Archives, Tohoku University
Masahiro Kayama: Graduate School of Science, Hiroshima University
Hirotsugu Nishido: Research Institute of Natural Sciences, Okayama University of Science
Naohisa Hirao: Japan Synchrotron Radiation Research Institute

Nature Communications, 2013, vol. 4, issue 1, 1-7

Abstract: Abstract Many craters and thick regoliths of the moon imply that it has experienced heavy meteorite bombardments. Although the existence of a high-pressure polymorph is a stark evidence for a dynamic event, few high-pressure polymorphs are found in a lunar sample. α-PbO2-type silica (seifertite) is an ultrahigh-pressure polymorph of silica, and is found only in a heavily shocked Martian meteorite. Here we show evidence for seifertite in a shocked lunar meteorite, Northwest Africa 4734. Cristobalite transforms to seifertite by high-pressure and -temperature condition induced by a dynamic event. Considering radio-isotopic ages determined previously, the dynamic event formed seifertite on the moon, accompanying the complete resetting of radio-isotopic ages, is ~2.7 Ga ago. Our finding allows us to infer that such intense planetary collisions occurred on the moon until at least ~2.7 Ga ago.

Date: 2013
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DOI: 10.1038/ncomms2733

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