Magnetic Susceptibility Analyses of Nanophase Iron Particle Diameters and Volumes Produced through Laser Irradiation.

Abstract:

Micrometeorite impacts greatly modify surfaces exposed to the space environment. This interaction vaporizes the surficial material and allows for the re-precipitation of minerals and iron. Characterizing the recondensed iron or nanophase metallic iron (npFe0) improves our interpretations in remote sensing of planetary surfaces. We irradiated olivine samples with energies simulating micrometeorite impact energies from around the inner Solar System. They revealed npFe0 as single domain (SD) and superparamagnetic (SPM) iron grains varying in size. Spectrally they changed the spectral reflectance of silicate minerals and contribute to “space weathering”: (1) darkens the overall reflectance, (2) steepens (or reddens) the spectral slope, and (3) decreases the contrast in the silicate 1 µm band. Using frequency dependent magnetic susceptibility (MS), we revealed patterns of npFe0 sizes. Fresh samples contained some nanophase magnetic sources due to decreasing magnetic susceptibility, when changing frequency from 4 kHz to 16 kHz. Using the fresh olivine as a standard, the lunar analog displayed increased MS at the lower 4 kHz indicating that more iron was transformed into magnetic sources. At 16 kHz, the MS decreased due to SPM particles that were being formed with sizes <10 nm. With the Mercury analog, at higher 16 kHz frequencies the MS increased rather than decreased. We can infer that the excess energy from our laser converted the amount of smaller <10 nm SPM particles by growth into an increasing volume of >10 nm particles. With the asteroid analog, we found a lower MS at 16 kHz, but nothing less MS than the Lunar analog. The 4 kHz MS was similar to the fresh olivine. At the lowest irradiation energy for the asteroid sample we have evidence that we are producing npFe0 particles. Our data compares well with traditional methods of forming npFe0, such as thermal processing of olivine, suggesting that with laser irradiation there is a linear increase of nanoparticles with SW time, and a logarithmic increase in spectral change also with SW time.