Buseck Center for Meteorite Studies

CMS Featured in ASU News! The main mass of a rare meteorite that exploded over California’s Sierra foothills in April 2012 will be preserved for current and future scientific discoveries, thanks to the collaborative efforts of five U.S. academic institutions. It has found a permanent home among: Arizona State University in Tempe, the Smithsonian Institution’s…

In late July, members of the Center attended the 76th Annual Meeting of the Meteoritical Society in Edmonton, Canada.  This year's conference was hosted by the University of Alberta, and featured a behind-the-scenes tour of their cryogenic meteorite facility, built specifically to house and curate frozen specimens of the Tagish Lake meteorite.  Director Meenakshi Wadhwa,…

The Perseid meteor shower is at its peak August 11 & 12, so make sure to take in the show!  At the shower's height, you can expect as many as 60 meteors per hour in the pre-dawn hours (fewer in urban areas).  The yearly Perseid meteor shower is the result of Earth's orbit intersecting the…

Did you know that the Center for Meteorite Studies offers loanable classroom modules focusing on The Origin of Meteorites? Module lessons and activities are aligned to the National Science Education Standards (Grades 5-12) and the Arizona Academic Content Standards, and modules can be loaned to K-12 and informal educators. Each module contains actual specimens (including meteorites!),…

The ASU Center for Meteorite Studies is pleased to announce that Brandon Johnson, a graduate student at Purdue University, is the recipient of the 2012 Nininger Meteorite Award! Brandon's paper, “Impact spherules as a record of an ancient heavy bombardment of Earth”, demonstrates a method to estimate the size and velocity of objects impacting Earth…