• DOI:10.1111/j.1945-5100.2009.01009.x
• Corpus ID: 129972426

Meteorite and meteoroid: New comprehensive definitions

@article{Rubin2010MeteoriteAM,
  title={Meteorite and meteoroid: New comprehensive definitions},
  author={Alan E. Rubin and Jeffrey N. Grossman},
  journal={Meteoritics \& Planetary Science},
  year={2010},
  volume={45}
}

• A. Rubin, J. Grossman
• Published 1 January 2010
• Geology, Physics
• Meteoritics & Planetary Science

Abstract– Meteorites have traditionally been defined as solid objects that have fallen to Earth from space. This definition, however, is no longer adequate. In recent decades, man‐made objects have fallen to Earth from space, meteorites have been identified on the Moon and Mars, and small interplanetary objects have impacted orbiting spacecraft. Taking these facts and other potential complications into consideration, we offer new comprehensive definitions of the terms “meteorite,”“meteoroid,” and their smaller counterparts: A meteoroid is a 10‐μm to 1‐m‐size natural solid object moving in interplanetary space. A micrometeoroid is a meteoroid 10 μm to 2 mm in size. A meteorite is a natural, solid object larger than 10 μm in size, derived from a celestial body, that was transported by natural means from the body on which it formed to a region outside the dominant gravitational influence of that body and that later collided with a natural or artificial body larger than itself (even if it is the same body from which it was launched). Weathering and other secondary processes do not affect an object’s status as a meteorite as long as something recognizable remains of its original minerals or structure. An object loses its status as a meteorite if it is incorporated into a larger rock that becomes a meteorite itself. A micrometeorite is a meteorite between 10 μm and 2 mm in size.