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Determining the elemental and isotopic makeup of cosmic
dust from residues in impact craters: preparation for the ISPE.
Stadermann F. J. and Floss C. (2008)
Meteorit. Planet. Sci. 43 (7, Suppl.), A147.
ABSTRACT
The Stardust mission used both aerogel tiles and Al foils to
gather dust from the coma of comet Wild 2. Although hypervelocity
impacts in solid metal targets are generally highly disruptive, the
residues were found to preserve significant portions of the original
projectile material. Analyses of crater residues led to the
identification of several surviving presolar grains among the cometary
samples. A second collector on the Stardust spacecraft was used to
capture possible contemporary interstellar dust traversing the solar
system. The study of these interstellar samples is analytically highly
challenging and the upcoming preliminary examination (ISPE) will
initially consist only of nondestructive surveys. Previously, we have
used the Auger spectrometer and the NanoSIMS for the elemental and
isotopic characterization of cometary dust residues at high spatial
resolution. We have now tested various analytical approaches for the
ISPE.
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