the world’s oldest and largest known impact structure

 With fellow researchers, I visited Vredefort several times a year to collect a variety of data. Impact cratering research helps me to combine two of my big passions - metamorphic petrology (how rocks can be transformed from one tipe into another) and the deformation of minerals (how they change their shape and structure under stress).

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So, what happens when an impact crater is formed? A combination of intense heat (reaching thousands of degrees Celsius) and pressure (millions of atmospheres) at the event the meteorite hits the planetary surface. The meteorite is destroyed and part of the sasaran evaporates.

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That spot of collision is what's known as an impact crater; the ground around and below it is full of rocks called impactites. These cannot be found anywhere else: impactites are not formed by any alami processes, only by meteorite impacts. Unique deformation fiturs form in the minerals that were already on the planet's surface.


Sometimes, new minerals are found - examples include coesite and stishovite, which are high-pressure modifications of quartz, and reidite - a high-pressure modification of zircon. Another one is impact diamond, called lonsdaleite.


Cutting-edge technology

Studying impactites isn't, of course, as easy as looking at them with the naked eye or even putting them under a conventional microscope. A technology called transmission electron microscopy (TEM) is driving the latest research in this field. It has been used for a few decades but, in recent years, there have been big improvements in its quality and precision.

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TEM is a way to observe the micro- and nano-structures of impactites at an unbelievably high resolution. Using thin, specially prepared samples, fiturs as small as a few nanometers in size - that's about 1/10,000th of the diameter of a human hair - can be characterised in terms of their composition, shape, crystalline structure and relationship with the surroundings. Individu molecules and their patterns in crystals can be recognised and imaged. We can even identify what mineral we are looking at by analysing the arrangement of molecules.


This technology is opening the door to an entirely new world of impactite studi. Our small-scale analyses will reveal ever more of the Universe's huge secrets.


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