What is a meteorite museum label for?
A museum label tells you the meteorite's name, what kind it is, where and when it fell or was found, and why it is special.
Next time you visit a museum, look closely at the little card or sign next to each meteorite. It is packed with useful information.
The name. Meteorites are named after the place where they fell or were found, such as Barwell, a village in England, or Allende, a village in Mexico. Some have numbers, such as NWA 7034, which means it was found in north-west Africa.
The type. The label tells you what kind of meteorite it is. It might say stony, iron or stony-iron, or use a code such as L6 or CM2. These codes are like a secret language that tells scientists what the meteorite is made of and what has happened to it.
Fall or find. It might say whether people saw it fall, called a fall, or found it later, called a find, and give the date.
The weight. It may tell you how heavy the piece is and how much of the meteorite was found altogether.
Why it matters. Good labels explain what makes the meteorite special. Perhaps it came from Mars, contains the oldest material in the Solar System, or hit a house!
Try this: pick your favourite meteorite in a museum and copy its label into a notebook. Then, at home, find out more about it. You could even make labels for your own rock collection, just like a museum curator.