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The carbonaceous chondrite meteorites are fragments of asteroids that have remained relatively unprocessed since the formation of the solar system 4.6 billion years ago. These carbon-rich objects contain a variety of extraterrestrial organic molecules that constitute a record of chemical evolution prior to the origin of life. Compound classes include aliphatic hydrocarbons, aromatic hydrocarbons, amino acids, carboxylic acids, sulfonic acids, phosphonic acids, alcohols, aldehydes, ketones, sugars, amines, amides, nitrogen heterocycles, sulfur heterocycles and a relatively abundant high molecular weight macromolecular material. Structural and stable isotopic characteristics suggest that a number of environments may have contributed to the organic inventory, including interstellar space, the solar nebula and the asteroidal meteorite parent body. This review covers work published between 1950 and the present day and cites 193 references.
Terrestrial planet formation is believed to have concluded in our Solar System with about 10 million to 100 million years of giant impacts, where hundreds of Moon- to Mars-sized planetary embryos acquired random velocities through gravitational encounters and resonances with one another and with Jupiter. This led to planet-crossing orbits and collisions that produced the four terrestrial planets, the Moon and asteroids. But here we show that colliding planets do not simply merge, as is commonly assumed. In many cases, the smaller planet escapes from the collision highly deformed, spun up, depressurized from equilibrium, stripped of its outer layers, and sometimes pulled apart into a chain of diverse objects. Remnants of these 'hit-and-run' collisions are predicted to be common among remnant planet-forming populations, and thus to be relevant to asteroid formation and meteorite petrogenesis.
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