Context:
In a new research published in Nature Communications, the age of meteorite Erg Chech 002 was calculated to be some 4.56556 billion years old. This is one of the most precise ages ever calculated for an object from space
Erg Chech 002:
- Erg Chech 002 (EC 002) is an ancient meteorite discovered in the Erg Chech region of the Sahara Desert in Algeria.
- Erg Chech 002 is an “achondrite”.
Erg Chech:
- A sandy region of the Sahara in western Algeria and northern Mali.
- It consists largely of shifting dunes.
An erg is a broad, flat area of desert covered with wind-swept sand with little or no vegetative cover.
Achondrites:
- Name meaning – “without chondrites”
- They are a relatively small but diverse group of meteorites.
- Most achondrites collected on Earth are derived from asteroids, but one small group is thought to come from Mars and another from the Moon.
Aluminium-26 and age of the solar system
- Around 4.5 billion years ago, our Solar System formed from a vast cloud of gas and dust.
- Among the many elements in this cloud was aluminium, which came in two forms.
- 1st -aluminium-27 – stable form.
- 2nd – aluminium-26 – a radioactive isotope mainly produced by exploding stars, which decays over time into magnesium-26.
- Aluminium-26 is very useful stuff for scientists who want to understand how the Solar System formed and developed. Because it decays over time, we can use it to date events – particularly within the first four or five million years of the Solar System’s life.
- It’s useful for determining the relative ages of different objects, but not their absolute age in years.
Source: The Hindu
Previous year question
The term ‘Goldilocks Zone’ is often seen news in the context of
[UPSC Civil Services Exam – 2015 Prelims]
(a) the limits of habitable zone above the surface of the Earth
(b) regions inside the Earth where shale gas is available
(c) search for the Earth-like planets in outer space
(d) search for meteorites containing precious metals
Answer: (c)
