News

Field Museum Scientists Study Ancient Asteroid Impact

Wed, 05/11/2011 - 15:15 -- Anonymous (not verified)

About 470 million years ago – in a time period called Ordovician – the parent asteroid of one of the L chondrites, one of the most common meteorite types, was disrupted in a collision with another body. This event led to a subsequent bombardment of Earth with collisional debris for at least 10 million years. This finding is reported in a recent study by Field Museum scientists Dr. Birger Schmitz (Research Associate), Robert A. Pritzker Assistant Curator of Meteoritics and Polar Studies Dr. Philipp Heck, and an international team of coauthors.

New Results from the Study of the Mifflin Meteorite: Space Travel Time and Preatmospheric Size

Thu, 02/10/2011 - 16:15 -- admin

Right after the Mifflin Meteorite fell in SW Wisconsin in April 2010 the Robert A. Pritzker Assistant Curator of Meteoritics and Polar Studies Dr. Philipp R. Heck coordinated an international study to determine the time it spent in space and to calculate its size in space before it got ablated and broke apart in our atmosphere.

Field Museum studies contemporary interstellar stardust

Sat, 01/15/2011 - 11:23 -- admin

Song lyrics aside, even when you catch a bit of stardust, it may take years to sort out what you've got.

Field Museum researchers have joined with scientists around the globe to find contemporary interstellar dust gathered by NASA's Stardust space mission launched more than a decade ago.

This story was featured on the December 14, 2010 show Scientific Chicago on WTTW Channel 11.

"Google Earth" Meteorite Gebel Kamil donated to the Field Museum

Thu, 10/21/2010 - 14:18 -- admin

Private meteorite collector and Collections & Research Committee member Terry Boudreaux donated to the Field Museum two specimens of the iron meteorite Gebel Kamil that formed a 45-m-wide impact crater in the southwestern corner of Egypt (East Uweinat Desert) near the Sudanese and Lybian border. The crater was discovered through Google Earth in 2009 on a Cretaceous sandstone surface; the impact has occurred less than 5000 years ago.

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