Northwest Africa 13543 (NWA 13543)

(Northwest Africa)

Purchased: 2020

Classification: Carbonaceous chondrite (CV3)

History: The meteorite was purchased from a dealer in Algeria.

Physical characteristics: Many light-grayish to greenish fragments, some of them with patches of fusion crust.

Petrography: The meteorite displays a grayish to dark-greenish interior and is composed of chondrules (mean diameter about 1 mm; up to 2.5 mm sized), large up to 1 cm sized CAIs, and olivine amoeboids embedded into a fine-grained, brownish-black matrix. Contains both, type I and type II chondrules. Several chondrules show reddish staining due to terrestrial alteration. Opaque phases are metal often occurring as blebs in chondrules, and sulfides. Both phases are sometimes altered to iron oxides.