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Science 22 November 1991:
Vol. 254. no. 5035, pp. 1188 - 1191
DOI: 10.1126/science.254.5035.1188
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Articles

Evidence for Multiple Sources of Diamond from Primitive Chondrites

S. S. RUSSELL 1, J. W. ARDEN 2, and C. T. PILLINGER 1

1 Planetary Sciences Unit, Department of Earth Sciences, Open University, Milton Keynes, United Kingdom MK7 6AA
2 Department of Earth Sciences, Oxford University, Oxford, United Kingdom, OX1 3PR

Fine-grained diamonds, the most abundant form of circumstellar dust isolated from primitive meteorites, have elemental and isotopic characteristics that are dependent on the host meteorite type. Carbon isotopic compositions vary from –32 to –38 per mil, and nitrogen associated with the diamond changes in overall abundance by over a factor of four from 0.2 to 0.9 weight percent, between ordinary and CM2-type chondrites. Although the ratio of carbon to nitrogen evolves in a distinctive way during combustion of diamond separates, metamorphic degassing of nitrogen is not the main cause of the differences in nitrogen content. The data suggest that intrinsic differences must have been inherited by the diamonds at the time of their formation and that the diamonds were distributed heterogeneously in the solar nebula during condensation. However, the hypothesis that a distinct nitrogen carrier remains hidden within the diamond cannot be ruled out.

Submitted on June 11, 1991
Accepted on August 23, 1991


THIS ARTICLE HAS BEEN CITED BY OTHER ARTICLES:
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C, N, and Noble Gas Isotopes in Grain Size Separates of Presolar Diamonds from Efremovka.
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Science 281, 1165-1168
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Terrestrial Carbon and Nitrogen Isotopic Ratios from Cretaceous-Tertiary Boundary Nanodiamonds.
I. Gilmour, I. Gilmour, S. S. Russell, J. W. Arden, M. R. Lee, I. A. Franchi, and C. T. Pillinger (1992)
Science 258, 1624-1626
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A New Type of Meteoritic Diamond in the Enstatite Chondrite Abee.
S. S. Russell, S. S. Russell, C. T. Pillinger, J. W. Arden, M. R. Lee, and U. Ott (1992)
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Science. ISSN 0036-8075 (print), 1095-9203 (online)