[Article Publication] A paper on the Martian meteorite nakhlite by Kakeru Kukihara (M.S., 2022), Associate Professor Miyahara, and JAMSTEC/Kochi Core Principal Researcher (Visiting Professor at Hiroshima University) Tomioka has been published in Meteoritics & Planetary Science.

In this study, the petrologic and mineralogical characteristics and alteration processes of nakhlites NWA 6148 and NWA 10153 were investigated, and both were found to be composed primarily of pyroxene, olivine, and mesostasis; NWA 6148 corresponds to a lava unit crystallized about 1.3 billion years ago, while the location of NWA 10153 is unknown, but it records two alteration environments: a reducing, neutral to alkaline environment and an oxidizing, acidic environment. It is suggested that these rapid changes in alteration environments may have been caused by impact events (Published paper url).