Spectral characteristics of lunar impact melts and inferred mineralogy

Abstract

Two suites of lunar impact melt samples have been measured in NASA's Reflectance Experiment Laboratory (RELAB) at Brown University. Suite 1 comprises seven Apollo 17 crystalline impact melt breccias and seven quenched glass equivalents. Suite 2 is made up of 15 additional impact melt samples (from Apollo 12, 15, 16, and 17) which exhibit a range of textures and compositions related to cooling conditions and glass abundance. A few of these samples have cooled slowly and fully crystallized, and thus have the same spectral properties as igneous rocks of similar texture and composition; they cannot be uniquely distinguished without geologic context. However, most of the impact melts and melt breccias contain either quantities of quenched glass and/or have developed microcrystalline nonequilibrium textures with well-defined, diagnostic spectral properties. The microcrystalline textures are associated with a distinctive 600-nm absorption feature, apparently due to submicroscopic ilmenite inclusions in a transparent host (typically fine-grained plagioclase). The reflectance properties of these lunar sample suites contribute to and constrain the identification and characterization of impact melts in remote sensing data. © The Meteoritical Society, 2010.