Abstract
Asteroid 2008TC3 was a Near Earth Asteroid that impacted the Earth on 2008 October 7. Meteorites were produced by the break-up of 2008TC3 in the high atmosphere and at present, about 600 meteorites - called Almahata Sitta - coming from 2008TC3 have been recovered. A mineralogical study of Almahata Sitta fragments shows that the asteroid 2008TC3 was made of meteorites of different types (ureilites, H, L, and E chondrites). Understanding the origin of this body and how it was put together remain a challenge. Here we perform a detailed spectroscopical and dynamical investigation to show that the most likely source region of 2008TC3 is in the inner Main Belt at low inclination (i<8 degrees). We show that asteroids with spectroscopic classes that can be associated with the different meteorite types of Almahata Sitta are present in the region of the Main Belt that includes the Nysa-Polana family and objects of the Background at low inclination. Searching for a possible scenario of formation for 2008TC3, we show that there is little chance that 2008TC3 was formed by low velocity collisions between asteroids of different mineralogies, in the current asteroid belt. It seems more likely that the heterogeneous composition of 2008TC3 was a inherited from a time when the asteroid belt was in a different dynamical state, most likely in the very early Solar System. Because ureilites are fragments of a large, thermally metamorphosed asteroid, this suggests that the phases of collisional erosion (the break-up of the ureilite parent-body) and collisional accretion (the formation of the parent body of 2008TC3) overlapped for some time in the primordial asteroid belt.
Highlights
Meteorites are a partial sample of asteroids that survive the passage through the Earth’s atmosphere
We show that asteroids with spectroscopic classes that can be associated with the different meteorite types of Almahata Sitta are present in the region of the Main Belt that includes the Nysa-Polana family and objects of the Background at low inclination
The identification of the source regions of the different type of meteorites is essential to be able to link the mineralogical properties of meteorites to the parent asteroids and, to address the mineralogical evolution in the asteroid belt
Summary
Meteorites are a partial sample of asteroids that survive the passage through the Earth’s atmosphere. Tracing back TC3 to its source region in the asteroid Main Belt would allow us to understand the origin of the Almahata Sitta meteorites and how TC3 was put together by loosely assembling meteorites of different mineralogies Establishing this link would be fundamental to shed light on the source region of ureilites, that albeit rare, are the forth major class of primitive meteorites recovered on Earth after the CV, CI and CO carbonaceous chondrites. In their attempt to find the source region of TC3 and Almahata Sitta, Jenniskens et al (2010) selected all B-class asteroids, according to the Bus classification, and objects of the Tholen F and B classes and searched for spectra similarities with TC3 and Almahata Sitta.
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