A 15-tonne meteorite which crashed down to Earth had two never-seen-before minerals inside it, scientists have revealed.
The huge rock slammed into Somalia in 2020 and according to the University of Alberta is said to be the ninth biggest ever found.
The university was sent a sample of the space rock in order to help classify it but was unable to identify parts of it.
Chris Herd, curator of the university’s meteorite collection, sought advice from Andrew Locock, head of the university’s Electron Microprobe Laboratory.
Mr Herd said: “The very first day he did some analyses, he said, ‘You’ve got at least two new minerals in there.
“That was phenomenal. Most of the time it takes a lot more work than that to say there’s a new mineral.”
One of the new minerals is called Elaliite and comes from the space object itself, which is called the “El Ali” meteorite since it was found near the town of El Ali in central Somalia.
Herd named the second one Elkinstantonite after Lindy Elkins-Tanton, vice president of Arizona State University’s Interplanetary Initiative.
“Lindy has done a lot of work on how the cores of planets form, how these iron nickel cores form, and the closest analogue we have are iron meteorites,” Mr Herd said.
“It made sense to name a mineral after her and recognise her contributions to science.”
The two new minerals were approved last month by the International Mineralogical Association.
Mr Herd added: “Whenever you find a new mineral, it means that the actual geological conditions, the chemistry of the rock, was different than what’s been found before.
"That’s what makes this exciting: In this particular meteorite you have two officially described minerals that are new to science.”
The El Ali meteorite the minerals came from appears to have been sent to China in search of a buyer, Mr Herd said.
Researchers are still analysing the minerals, and potentially a third one, to find out what the conditions were in the meteorite when the space rock formed.
Mr Herd added: “Whenever there’s a new material that’s known, material scientists are interested too because of the potential uses in a wide range of things in society."
