I think you have summed it up. It looks like a fulgerite (formed when lighting strikes the ground, typically spongly glass with all sorts of strange things in it). Heck, they even mention fulgerite (and rather unsuccessfully discount it).
Look, I am not saying that this claim of space fossils is anything but bogus, but when the debunking is bogus, that gets my attention.
The lab work was done at Cardiff University.
Quote from: Danderman on 03/14/2013 03:46 amLook, I am not saying that this claim of space fossils is anything but bogus, but when the debunking is bogus, that gets my attention.Which part of Phil Plaits debunking here: http://www.slate.com/blogs/bad_astronomy/2013/03/11/meteorite_life_claims_of_fossils_in_a_meteorite_are_still_wrong.html is "bogus"? Be specific.
Fig 1a shows the location of the fall. Fig 1b shows a photograph of a small piece of the meteorite that was sent by one of us (AS) for study at the Buckingham Centre for Astrobiology and Cardiff University.Other sources indicate that the rock in question was obtained by the local police, and forwarded to government authorities.
As I mentioned before, the lab work was allegedly performed at Cardiff University. If some of the key assertions were based on mis-reporting the CU lab work, we will hear about that soon.
Not really. They can present the data correctly (the oxygen isotope ratio is ...) while coming to incorrect conclusions about it (therefore aliens!!!!111
I did find a story on the internet where these guys were saying a month ago that they found "viable" diatoms inside the rock, so that would be a good indicator that they are dealing with terrestrial life, and not fossils.
"A farmer’s wife has become unconscious after smelling a piece of meteorite that had fallen to a paddy field at Kudawewa in Dimbulagala on December 29. The farmer’s hands have been burnt by the meteorite.
http://www.island.lk/index.php?page_cat=article-details&page=article-details&code_title=74157Tests in US, Germany reconfirm Aralaganwila findsOxygen Isotope experiments at Harvard University in America and Gottingen University in Germany had proved that the rock fragments found at Aralaganwila in Polonnaruwa on December 29 last year were meteorite fragments, Medical Research Institute (MRI) Director Dr. Anil Samaranayake said yesterday.
Did this really happen?
Quote from: Dalhousie on 03/14/2013 03:17 amI think you have summed it up. It looks like a fulgerite (formed when lighting strikes the ground, typically spongly glass with all sorts of strange things in it). Heck, they even mention fulgerite (and rather unsuccessfully discount it).I am attaching an image of the Sri Lankan "meteorite" and some images of fulgurite that I found on Google. Please tell me why you think these are similar, keeping in mind that fulgurite typically forms a tube shape.
Quote from: Danderman on 03/14/2013 04:00 amQuote from: Dalhousie on 03/14/2013 03:17 amI think you have summed it up. It looks like a fulgerite (formed when lighting strikes the ground, typically spongly glass with all sorts of strange things in it). Heck, they even mention fulgerite (and rather unsuccessfully discount it).I am attaching an image of the Sri Lankan "meteorite" and some images of fulgurite that I found on Google. Please tell me why you think these are similar, keeping in mind that fulgurite typically forms a tube shape.I have seen lots of fulgurite and have yet to see an example that has that classic carrot or tree shape that you showed. Most are just irreuglar fragments of vesicular glassy material, just like the sample from Sri Lanka. I have a nice lump of it at home, I will try and find it, it's somewhere in the garage.....
What if the meteor was hit by lightning while it entered and descended thru Earth's atmosphere? Could that produce a fulgerite looking rock as well as having enough logic to still be a meteorite/meteoroid?
Here is a hand-sized piece of fulgurite I picked up in Western Australia about 25 years ago.
Quote from: RigelFive on 03/15/2013 07:02 amWhat if the meteor was hit by lightning while it entered and descended thru Earth's atmosphere? Could that produce a fulgerite looking rock as well as having enough logic to still be a meteorite/meteoroid?A lighting strike on a descending metroite is unlikely but not impossible.It isn't going to change it's compostion, though,the composition is far to siliceous to be a meteorite. It is also unlikely to create a vesicular texture. There is no way it could introduce the diatoms.Fulgurite does however have the right texture, composition and can include diatoms.
How about finding diatoms inside fulgurite, is that common?
I realize that experts are people too, but the collection of samples doesn't seem to have been taken by experts. I would have thought that a scientific foundation would have coughed up a few tens of thousands of dollars to send a team of meterorite collectors to the site.
In addition, where are the photomicrographs of selected slices of the object?
Oxygen Isotope experiments at Harvard University in America and Gottingen University in Germany had proved that the rock fragments found at Aralaganwila in Polonnaruwa on December 29 last year were meteorite fragments, Medical Research Institute (MRI) Director Dr. Anil Samaranayake said yesterday.Link to Harvard and Gottingen please? There, I used the magic word.
Quote from: Dalhousie on 03/15/2013 05:57 amHere is a hand-sized piece of fulgurite I picked up in Western Australia about 25 years ago. I was going to take the liberty of reposting your foto in B&W, but the JPEG wouldn't download.