Determining chondrule size distributions from thin‐section measurements

Abstract

Abstract— A method is described for correcting thin‐section‐derived chondrule sizes for three common sources of bias: (1) the non‐equatorial sectioning of chondrules, (2) the non‐zero thickness of thin sections, and (3) the unequal probability of sectioning different size chondrules. Application of the correction procedure to chondrule data from CO chondrites results in a reduction of mean and median chondrule diameters, an increase in minimum diameters, and transforms nearly log‐normal distributions to distributions that conform to a Weibull probability function. The Weibull‐function form of CO chondrule size distributions is similar to the form of chondrule distributions in ordinary chondrites obtained by disaggregation analyses.