The silicate material in comets

Abstract

Silicates in comets appear to be a mix of high-temperature crystalline enstatite and forsterite plus glassy or amorphous grains that formed at lower temperatures. The mineral identifications from the 10 and 20 μm cometary spectra are consistent with the composition of anhydrous chondritic aggregate IDPs. The origin of the cometary silicates remains puzzling. While the evidence from the IDPs points to a pre-solar origin of both crystalline and glassy components, the signatures of crystalline silicates appear in the spectra of young stellar objects only at a late evolutionary stage, when comets are the likely source of the dust.