Meteorite Studies (BCMS) personnel recently participated in the annual meeting of the NASA-chartered Extraterrestrial Materials Analysis Group (ExMAG).
ExMAG is a community-based, interdisciplinary group that provides a forum for discussion and analysis of matters concerning the collection, curation, and analysis of extraterrestrial samples, including planning future sample return missions. Center Research Scientist Dr. Jemma Davidson is an executive committee member of ExMAG, currently serving as ExMAG Vice Chair. As such, Davidson coordinates content for the ExMAG annual meeting, including identifying critical topics of community interest.
“The annual ExMAG meeting is a great place to discuss issues related to extraterrestrial sample collection, curation and analysis,” says Davidson. “But we also encourage the community to bring any issues to us throughout the year and can be contacted through the ExMAG website.”
The three-day hybrid format meeting focused on NASA’s extraterrestrial materials collections, curation, and sample return activities, and comprised online poster sessions and oral presentations. The meeting also included updates from NASA HQ and curation as well as reports on the collections, sample return activities in progress and planned, advanced curation methods, NASA funding and facilities, and data archiving.
The Center’s Carleton B. Moore meteorite collection was represented in the poster session, and Center Assistant Research Professor Dr. Amy Jurewicz lead the Genesis Workshops Summary and Q&A on the archiving of solar wind samples returned by the NASA Genesis spacecraft.
