Journal
JOURNAL OF GEOPHYSICAL RESEARCH-PLANETS
Volume 124, Issue 12, Pages 3205-3218Publisher
AMER GEOPHYSICAL UNION
DOI: 10.1029/2019JE005992
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Funding
- NSERC
- Canada Research Chair
- Government of Ontario Early Researcher Award
- Natural Science Foundation of China [41490631]
- Key Research Program of Frontier Sciences
- Chinese Academy of Sciences [QYZDJ-SSW-DQC001]
- China Scholarship Council
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The Apollo 17 poikilitic impact melt breccias were initially interpreted to be directly related to the Serenitatis basin formation. Here we present petrological, geochemical, and U-Pb geochronological investigations of the poikilitic impact melt of Apollo 73155,69 which was sampled from the South Massif of the Taurus-Littrow valley. Nanoscale secondary ion mass spectrometry analyses of well-preserved poikilitic zircons from sample 73155,69 yield a uniform Pb-207/Pb-206 age population with a weighted mean age of 3921 +/- 14 Ma. The zircons have distinctly high concentrations of Y (3279-6347 ppm) and Th (254-302 ppm) compared with other Apollo 17 zircons. These characteristics, together with their textures, are remarkably similar to those of zircons from high-Th melt breccias from Apollo 12 samples and lunar meteorite Sayh al Uhaymir 169 attributed to the formation of the high-Th deposits of the Imbrium basin. We therefore propose an Imbrium provenance for melt component in 73155,69. Our results provide new evidence for components of Imbrium-type ejecta occurring among the South Massif breccias. Consequently, the Apollo 17 poikilitic impact melt breccias may not represent Serenitatis ejecta.
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