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#Mars

Rocks blasted off Mars by impacts that later fell to Earth, and what they tell us about the red planet.

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Lessons (5)

Courses (10)

  • Gravitational fields and escapeHow does a rock leave Mars, the Moon or the asteroid Vesta? Newton's law of gravitation and the idea of gravitational potential give the
  • Mass spectrometry and oxygen isotopesMass spectrometers measure isotope ratios to within about ten parts per million. Oxygen's three isotopes then sort meteorites into famil
  • How meteorites are classifiedTens of thousands of meteorites are sorted into a system of classes and groups. This lesson explains the main branches and what the labels o
  • Rocks from the Moon and MarsSeveral hundred meteorites are pieces of the Moon or Mars, thrown off by impacts. This lesson explains how they were identified and what the
  • Adult course: Meteorites from first principlesTwelve lessons for adult learners: where meteorites come from, how falls are tracked and recovered, how they are classified and dated, what
  • Our Solar System and where space rocks liveThe Sun, eight planets, their moons and millions of smaller bodies make up our Solar System.
  • Rocks from the Moon and MarsA few meteorites have come from the Moon and from Mars. In this lesson you will find out how a rock can escape a world and how scientists kn
  • What is a meteorite?A meteorite is a piece of rock or metal from space that has landed on Earth. This lesson gives you the three words every space-rock scientis
  • Gravity, weight and orbitsGravity holds the Solar System together and decides where meteorites end up. In this lesson you will calculate weight on different worlds an
  • The small bodies of the Solar SystemBetween and beyond the planets are millions of asteroids and comets. This lesson sets out where they are, how far away they are and how a pi

Books (2)

Famous meteorites (10)

  • ALH 84001A potato-sized rock from Mars that sparked a worldwide debate about life beyond Earth.
  • Allan Hills 81005A golf-ball-sized rock found in Antarctica in 1982 – the first meteorite recognised as coming from the Moon.
  • ChassignySeen to fall in France in 1815, this olivine-rich stone was the first known Martian meteorite to be witnessed falling.
  • Dar al Gani 476A Martian rock found in the Libyan Sahara in 1998, packed with olivine crystals and part of a family of desert finds.
  • KaidunA small stone that fell on a military base in Yemen in 1980 and turned out to be a jigsaw of many different worlds.
  • NakhlaThe 1911 Egyptian fall that gave its name to a whole family of Martian meteorites – and a story about a very unlucky dog.
  • NWA 7034Nicknamed Black Beauty, this dark Martian breccia contains the oldest pieces of Mars yet found.
  • ShergottyThe 1865 fall in India that gave its name to the most common family of Martian meteorites.
  • TissintIn 2011 a fireball over the Moroccan desert delivered the freshest pieces of Mars that scientists had seen in half a century.
  • ZagamiA piece of Martian lava that landed close to a Nigerian farmer in 1962 – the largest single Martian stone ever seen to fall.

Meteorite types (8)

  • AchondritesIgneous stones from bodies that melted: asteroids, the Moon and Mars. An achondrite is a stony meteorite without chondrules.
  • ChassignitesOlivine-rich Martian rocks; the first known fell in France in 1815. Chassignites are dunites, rocks made almost entirely of olivine, that fo
  • Martian meteoritesRocks from Mars, recognised by gas from the Martian atmosphere trapped inside them.
  • ALH 84001 and other Martian rocksThe ancient Martian rock once claimed to hold fossils, and 'Black Beauty'. Allan Hills 84001, found in Antarctica in December 1984,
  • NakhlitesAugite-rich volcanic rocks from Mars, about 1.3 billion years old. Nakhlites, named after Nakhla in Egypt (fell 1911), are made mainly of au
  • Planetary achondritesRocks knocked off the Moon and Mars by impacts. A few achondrites come not from asteroids but from much larger worlds.
  • ShergottitesThe most common Martian meteorites: young basaltic and olivine-rich rocks. Shergottites, named after Shergotty in India (fell 1865), make up
  • Stony meteoritesMeteorites made mostly of silicate minerals. They are by far the most common kind seen to fall.

Space missions (8)

  • CuriosityA car-sized laboratory exploring an ancient lake bed, and finding iron meteorites on the way.
  • HeraEurope's detective mission to study the asteroid moon that DART struck. DART showed that an asteroid can be nudged, but telescopes on Ea
  • Mars ExpressEurope's long-lived Mars orbiter, which has made the closest flybys of the moon Phobos.
  • MMX (Martian Moons eXploration)Japan's mission to bring back the first sample from a moon of Mars. Mars has two small, dark moons, Phobos, about 22 kilometres across,
  • OpportunityThe rover that found the first meteorite ever identified on another planet. Opportunity and its twin, Spirit, were golf-cart-sized rovers de
  • Perseverance and Mars Sample ReturnA rover filling sealed tubes with Martian rock for a trip home that has yet to be arranged.
  • Mission timeline213 milestones in the exploration of asteroids, comets, the Moon and Mars, from Luna and Apollo to Hayabusa2, OSIRIS-REx and Chang'e 6.
  • Viking 1 and 2The landers that sniffed the Martian air, and so proved that some meteorites come from Mars.

Meteorite minerals (21)

  • AhrensiteThe iron-rich, spinel-structured form of olivine, the iron partner of ringwoodite. Ahrensite has the chemistry of fayalite and the structure
  • AugiteThe common dark high-calcium pyroxene of basalts, from Earth to the Moon, Mars and Vesta.
  • BaddeleyiteZirconium oxide, a tiny but powerful clock for dating Martian, lunar and asteroid basalts. Baddeleyite is zirconium oxide.
  • ChenmingiteA dense form of chromite, made by shock, found in a Martian meteorite. Chenmingite has the same chemistry as chromite, iron chromium oxide,
  • FeiiteA dense iron-rich titanium oxide found with tschaunerite and liuite in Shergotty. Feiite is an iron titanium oxide with more iron than ulvös
  • JarositeA potassium iron sulphate that marks acidic water on Mars, found in a Martian meteorite and by a rover.
  • KaersutiteA titanium-rich amphibole found in tiny melt pockets in Martian meteorites. Kaersutite is an amphibole, a double-chain silicate containing h
  • LiebermannitePotassium feldspar packed into the dense hollandite structure, found in a Martian meteorite. Liebermannite is the high-pressure form of pota
  • LiuiteIlmenite composition in the perovskite structure, found in a shock-melt pocket in Shergotty.
  • MaskelynitePlagioclase feldspar turned to glass by shock, without melting, while keeping its crystal shape.
  • MerrilliteThe main phosphate mineral of most meteorites and of lunar and Martian rocks. Merrillite is a calcium phosphate with sodium and magnesium.
  • OlivineThe green magnesium–iron silicate that is the most common mineral in stony meteorites and the gem crystals of pallasites.
  • PigeoniteA low-calcium pyroxene that forms in quickly cooled lavas, typical of eucrites and lunar and Martian basalts.
  • PyroxferroiteAn iron-rich silicate that forms in the last melt of lunar and Martian basalts. Pyroxferroite is a chain silicate similar in chemistry to ir
  • SaponiteA swelling clay mineral intergrown with serpentine in CI chondrites and in samples from Ryugu and Bennu.
  • SeifertiteThe densest known natural form of silica, formed by shock in Martian meteorites. Seifertite is silicon dioxide with a structure related to t
  • StöffleriteCalcium feldspar in the dense hollandite structure: the high-pressure partner of anorthite.
  • TissintiteA high-pressure, calcium-rich pyroxene formed by shock from feldspar in a Martian meteorite.
  • TschauneriteA dense iron titanium oxide formed from ulvöspinel in a shock-melt pocket in Shergotty.
  • ZagamiiteA dense calcium aluminium silicate that crystallised from shock melt in Martian meteorites.
  • ZirconA tough zirconium silicate that holds uranium, making it one of the best natural clocks.

Glossary (42)

Questions and answers (33)

Impact craters (2)

  • HaughtonHaughton Crater, on Devon Island in Canada's High Arctic territory of Nunavut, is often described as the closest thing to Mars on Earth.
  • TsenkherTsenkher is a young impact crater about 3.7 km across in the steppe of central Mongolia.

Comets (1)

  • Comet 3I/ATLASThe third visitor from another star, found in July 2025 and watched by a fleet of spacecraft across the Solar System.

Micrometeorites (2)

History (1)

  • Nakhla, 1911: a rock from MarsOne of only five Martian meteorites seen to fall. On 28 June 1911, around 40 stones fell near El Nakhla el Baharia, east of Alexandria in Eg

People (8)

  • Carl AgeeThe New Mexico scientist who led the 2013 study of Black Beauty, a Martian breccia full of water-bearing minerals and ancient crust. Carl B.
  • Colin PillingerThe Open University scientist who studied carbon in meteorites and led Beagle 2, Britain's lander for Mars.
  • David McKayThe NASA scientist who led the 1996 study suggesting that the Martian meteorite ALH 84001 might hold traces of ancient life.
  • Donald BogardThe NASA scientist who found Martian air trapped in a meteorite in 1983, proving that some meteorites come from Mars. Donald D.
  • Gustav TschermakThe Vienna mineralogist who named maskelynite, the shocked glass in the Shergotty meteorite, and helped classify meteorites.
  • Harry McSweenThe planetary geologist who helped prove that the SNC meteorites come from Mars and wrote widely read books on meteorites and their parent w
  • Monica GradyThe British planetary scientist who curated meteorites at the Natural History Museum, edited the world catalogue and worked on the Rosetta c
  • Roberta ScoreThe NASA laboratory manager who picked up ALH 84001 on the Antarctic ice in December 1984, the most famous Martian meteorite of all.

Museums and collections (4)

Strewn fields (1)

  • The Tissint strewn fieldOnly the fifth Martian meteorite seen to fall, its glossy black stones gathered from a remote desert valley months later.

Meteorites (the 60 largest of 121)