Meteorite Curation

The clean lab at NASA Johnson Space Center is where meteorites are curated.

After collection, the meteorites are shipped frozen to the Antarctic Meteorite Processing Laboratory at NASA Johnson Space Center. It is a special clean lab similar to that which houses the Apollo Moon rocks. The meteorites are thawed in stainless steel glove cabinets containing nitrogen gas. This drives off all the water and ice that could otherwise rust the metal in the meteorites. The cabinets also keep the samples clean from many types of possible contaminants, therefore most samples are stored in these cabinets.

Meteorites are described and split on a flow bench in the clean lab.

Curation of meteorites involves storing, describing, classifying, and announcing new meteorites for study, and later splitting them for distribution to investigators around the world. Most meteorites are described and split into smaller chips on flow benches using clean tools.

There are many different varieties of meteorites, but the major classifications are stony, iron, and stony-iron meteorites. Stony meteorites are made mostly of the same silicate minerals as are found in Earth rocks. Iron meteorites are made mostly of iron-nickel metal. Stony-irons are part of each. Stony meteorites are the most common meteorites and are divided into chondrites, which contain round silicate blobs called chondrules, and achondrites which do not. There are numerous subdivisions of each type of meteorite.