Statistical properties of the Transantarctic Mountains (TAM) micrometeorite collection

Abstract Micrometeorites have been recovered from traps located at the summit of nunataks in the Transantarctic Mountains (TAM), Antarctica. They constitute the TAM micrometeorite collection. Micrometeorites accumulated by direct infall for hundreds of thousands of years. This long collection durati...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Polar Science
Main Authors: Clément Suavet, Ralph P. Harvey, Luigi Folco, Jérôme Gattacceca, Myriam Kars, Pierre Rochette
Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
Language:English
Published: 2009
Subjects:
NEANIAS Atmospheric Research Community
French National Research Agency (ANR)
General Earth and Planetary Sciences
Ecology
Aquatic Science
Evolution
Behavior and Systematics
Antarctic
South Pole
Transantarctic Mountains
Walcott
Antarc*
Antarctica
South pole
Online Access:https://www.openaccessrepository.it/record/87187
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.polar.2009.06.003
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Summary:Abstract Micrometeorites have been recovered from traps located at the summit of nunataks in the Transantarctic Mountains (TAM), Antarctica. They constitute the TAM micrometeorite collection. Micrometeorites accumulated by direct infall for hundreds of thousands of years. This long collection duration is confirmed by the wide range of weathering by dissolution of olivine in the stony micrometeorites from the TAM collection. A statistical study of the size distribution and frequency by type of this collection, and comparison with other Antarctic micrometeorite collections (the South Pole Water Well collection and the Walcott Neve collection), suggest that the TAM collection is essentially unbiased. Thanks to the very long exposure of the traps, large diameter (>1000 μm) micrometeorites are present in sufficiently large numbers to allow a statistically meaningful estimate of their size distribution in this size range for the first time. We found that the slope of the size distribution remains constant in the 100–1600 μm size range. Therefore, the size distribution of micrometeorites in this size range is controlled by a single process.

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