Lionel is a co-author on this interesting new paper in Science on the origin of Earth’s water. Enstatite chondrites were previously thought to be a building block of Earth because they match in various isotopes systems, most importantly oxygen. This work shows that the ECs can also bring plenty of water to Earth, and EC water has a deuterium abundance that matches Earth’s primordial water composition. Fascinating work that leads to lots more questions!
Katharina wins the 2021 Leonard Medal
The Leonard Medal from the Meteoritical Society, the top prize in our field for contributions to meteoritics, was awarded to Wash U’s Katharina Lodders for 2021. It’s hard to overstate Katharina’s contributions to cosmochemistry. Her papers on the Solar System abundances are the most cited works in our field. Though her official affiliation is with Earth & Planetary Science, I consider her a part of our department too as she’s been a long-time collaborator with us and other research groups in physics. I’ve benefited personally from Katharina’s enormous expertise across planetary science and astrophysics — she is always willing to talk and guide me in the right direction on a new research question.
With both the Leonard Medal and Nier Prize for 2021, by Katharina and Nan, Wash U is clearly a world-leading institution in meteoritics and cosmochemistry.
Straight Outta Antarctica
This is a backscattered electron image mosaic of Dominion Range 14359, collected by the ANSMET crew in Antarctica in 2014.
