Strange diamonds from an ancient dwarf planet in our solar system may have formed shortly after the dwarf planet collided with a large asteroid about 4.5 billion years ago. A team of scientists says they have confirmed the existence of lonsdaleite, a rare hexagonal form of diamond, in ureilite me
– found evidence of how lonsdaleite formed in ureilite meteorites. They published their findings on September 12 in the. Geologist Professor Andy Tomkins from Monash University led the study.
“This study proves categorically that lonsdaleite exists in nature,” said McCulloch, Director of the RMIT Microscopy and Microanalysis Facility. “There’s strong evidence that there’s a newly discovered formation process for the lonsdaleite and regular diamond, which is like a supercritical chemical vapor deposition process that has taken place in these space rocks, probably in the dwarf planet shortly after a catastrophic collision,” McCulloch said.
Tomkins said the group proposed that lonsdaleite in the meteorites formed from a supercritical fluid at high temperature and moderate pressures, almost perfectly preserving the shape and textures of the pre-existing graphite.
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