Cape York - The "Lakelands", Starting sol 2703 |
Cape York - The "Lakelands", Starting sol 2703 |
Sep 1 2011, 04:30 PM
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Senior Member Group: Moderator Posts: 4279 Joined: 19-April 05 From: .br at .es Member No.: 253 |
Bye bye, Tisdale. It's time to move on.
Next target? Philosilicates. ----- Edited on Sep 16 2011. This thread is dedicated to the exploration of Cape York, starting on sol 2703 when Opportunity left the "rocky garden" and started moving towards Chester Lake. |
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Sep 22 2011, 09:19 AM
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Senior Member Group: Members Posts: 2998 Joined: 30-October 04 Member No.: 105 |
Good points, Tom.
I think we are seeing glasses (impact melts) here-- we certainly see impact breccias with many angular clasts that have a vitreous appearance. If not from Endeavour, then from any of the several other impacts evident in the area. We don't see that many Precambrian glasses here on Earth. But PC rocks here have been buried, metamorphosed, tectonicizated and generally weathered in a warm and wet oxidizing environment. On Mars, they've been in dry storage for megamillenia (by comparison), so I think that a glass would stay glassy much longer. But this is the first example we've been of the type, so who knows... Google in usually your friend, but in this case was a tangle of ambiguity. Most of the hits for "perlite" were for the garden soil additive with loose pointers towards the volcanic glass mineral. And I've not seen my copy of Dana for decades... What was the source of that "perlite" photo you showed? I tried to back my way out through the "bigcache.googleapis.com" URL but I got 404'd. Nice new Pancams of site "Chester Lake2" this AM, and the tracking web suggests more MI's upcoming with soem APXS work. Then, I've heard, Oppy'll be moving on by the weekend. These are interesting times... --Bill -------------------- |
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Sep 22 2011, 01:14 PM
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Senior Member Group: Members Posts: 2173 Joined: 28-December 04 From: Florida, USA Member No.: 132 |
...Google in usually your friend... It can still be your friend if you Google "perlite ore".Here's one concise description from a company whose claim to fame is owning both ore mining and processing facilities: "Perlite Ore is formed by magmatic ("liquid rock") processes, usually in "domes",that over geologic time periods entrap water into the Perlite matrix. The mechanism through which this occurs is not completely understood, however, it is this entrapped water which gives perlite ore it's unique ability to "Pop" under proper high temperature conditions." |
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