70% of meteors reaching Earth may have only three sources

A group of scientists suggest approximately: 70% of meteors that reach Earth come from three families of space rocks. The researchers reached this conclusion through analysis of three related studies; The articles were published in the scientific journals Astronomy & Astrophysics and Nature.

Although very few meteors seem to hit the planet, tons of space rocks reach Earth every day. Because most of these objects are so small, they usually burn up in the atmosphere.

The studies were conducted by researchers from the Center National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS), the European Southern Observatory (ESO) and Charles University in the Czech Republic.

According to the data, 70 percent of all recorded meteorite falls may have been caused by three families of asteroids resulting from explosions that occurred between 5 and 40 million years ago. Those responsible are asteroids Karin, Koronis and Massalia; The latter is even responsible for approximately 37% of all meteors known to science.

“Specifically, H chondrites (meteor types) originate from two ruptures related to the asteroids (832) Karin and (158) Koronis that occurred 5.7 and 7.6 million years ago. It is explained in the introduction of the study that “L chondrites originated from a cratering or re-deposition event on the Massalia asteroid approximately 40 million years ago (20).

Origin of meteors

It is important to highlight This does not mean that meteorites falling on other planets and celestial bodies have the same origin.. Due to Earth’s location in the Solar System, debris from Karin, Koronis and Massalia, located in the main asteroid belt, has a certain ‘ease’ to reach our planet.

Scientists also claim that these asteroid families that produced meteorites in ancient impacts are now ‘dried up’ sources. This means that over time other newer asteroids will be sources of new meteorites and will eventually replace parts from Karin, Koronis and Massalia.

Along with the results of the studies; 90% of the meteors observed by the team were detected, while the source of the remaining 10% is unknown. Researchers also used data from computer simulations to trace the origins of giant asteroids that could threaten to collide with Earth.

“This historic discovery was made possible by combining a telescopic survey of the composition of all major asteroid families in the main belt with state-of-the-art computer simulations of the collisional evolution and dynamics of these large families.” in an official statement.

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