http://www.esse.epms.es.tohoku.ac.jp/project-en.html
•Professor Tomoki Nakamura,
Evolution of Early Solar System, Primitive Meteorites, Interplanetary Dust and Cometary Particles
•Lecturer Daisuke Nakashima
•Assistant Professor Megumi Matsumoto

 

Our solar system had begun as a protoplanetary disk that consists mainly of hydrogen gas with minor amounts of tiny cosmic dust. Within the disk close to the young sun, high-temperature processes such as evaporation and melting of the dust took place. The first solid material in the solar system, CAIs, and the second material chondrules formed in the disk by evaporation, condensation and melting of preexisting cosmic dust. CAIs, chondrules, and cosmic dust accreted to form small bodies in the disk. They are first planetary bodies in the solar system. Most of the small bodies further accreted to form planets such as Earth and Mars, but some remain as asteroids and comets. Therefore, studying of primitive meteorites and dust particles from asteroids and comets elucidate early solar system evolution. This is the reason why we study such primitive solar-system materials.