What a Misplaced Meteorite Told Us About Mars

The Lafayette Meteorite was chipped off the surface of Mars and then sped through space for roughly 11 million years. It eventually found its way into a drawer at Purdue University in 1931 and has since been teaching scientists about Mars. (Photo provided by Purdue Brand Studio.)

11 million years ago, Mars was a frigid, dry, dead world, just like it is now. Something slammed into the unfortunate planet, sending debris into space. A piece of that debris made it to Earth, found its way into a drawer at Purdue University, and then was subsequently forgotten about.

Until 1931, when scientists studied and realized it came directly from Mars. What has it told them about the red planet?

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Asteroid Samples Were Once Part of a Wetter World

This is a microscope image of a dark Bennu particle, about a millimeter long, with a crust of bright phosphate. To the right is a smaller fragment that broke off. The presence of phosphate hints that Bennu may have once been part of an ocean world. Image Credit: Lauretta & Connolly et al. (2024) Meteoritics & Planetary Science

Nine months have passed since NASA’s OSIRIS-REx returned its samples of asteroid Bennu to Earth. The samples are some of the Solar System’s primordial, pristine materials. They’ve made their way into scientists’ hands, and their work is uncovering some surprises.

Some of the material in the samples indicates that Bennu had a watery past.

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