Sara Russell and the Winchcombe Meteorite on Asteroid Day LIVE
Sara Russell and the Winchcombe Meteorite on Asteroid Day LIVE https://asteroidday-uploads.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/15082345/unnamed-1.jpeg 512 341 Asteroid Day https://asteroidday-uploads.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/15082345/unnamed-1.jpeg
Planetary Scientist Sara Russell and the Winchcombe meteorite made an appearance on this year’s Asteroid Day LIVE 2022 where she explained why this particular meteorite is so fascinating. Co-author of a book Meteorites, Sara is the current leader of the Planetary Materials Group at the Natural History Museum, London.
Sara is also involved in some of the most monumental asteroid missions to date including; NASA’s OSIRIS-REx mission, JAXA’s Hayabusa2 mission and JAXA’s future MMX mission. Her research interests are in the formation and evolution of the Solar System and the Earth’s moon. At the Museum, she and her team are currently researching the origin of Earth’s water, the primordial composition of the inner solar system, and the characterisation of their new favourite meteorite, Winchcombe.
Winchcombe Meteorite, Photo Credit: Natural History Museum of London
This past June, Sara took the Asteroid Day LIVE stage to discuss the study of meteorites in understanding the formation and beginnings of our Solar System.
“We’re lucky to have extra-terrestrial material raining down on the Earth and producing meteorites. Now in the museums and universities all over the world there are tens of thousands meteorites to work on. We know that most of them come from asteroids and they are particularly interesting because they formed in the earliest times of the Solar System.”
Winchombe residents next to the meteorite impact. Photo Credit: Rob Wilcock.
Sara has brought this special meteorite to the BCE studio. It fell into the driveway of a Winchcombe resident in early 2021. The meteorite has been identified as a carbonaceous chondrite –a favourite of Sara’s due to its organic materials and water. This type of meteorite also provides insight into the early history of the solar system and comprises about 3 percent of all meteorites that have landed on Earth.
Watch Asteroid Day LIVE 2022 Origins of the Solar System panel to find out where the Winchcombe meteorite came from in our Solar System, what are the links between meteorites and asteroids, why asteroid missions are so important and much more.
