Last Thursday (13), researchers from the National Museum presented Santa Filomena, the first piece to be incorporated into the institution’s meteorite collection after the 2018 fire.
Weighing about 2.8 kg, the fragment was acquired by the National Museum after a meteorite shower, in 2020, over the city of Santa Filomena, in Pernambuco. The place was literally “invaded” by dozens of onlookers, researchers and even hunters from abroad, who were after the stones.
The National Museum/UFRJ researcher Maria Elizabeth Zucolotto, who is a pioneer in meteorite research, along with colleagues Amanda Tosi, Diana Andrade and Sara Nunes, was among the first people to arrive in the city. They were the only representatives of science and managed to obtain the studied samples.
According to professor Elizabeth Zucolotto, “among the various fragments that fell in the city, this one was chosen to compose the museum’s collection because it presents unique characteristics. Among them, the presence of a fresh melting crust and depressions on the surface that look like finger marks, less common to be seen in examples of the rocky type”. The professor points out that the meteorite has flow lines that go down the sides, formed in fragments that maintain a very stable orientation as they pass through the atmosphere.
solar system fossil
The Santa Filomena meteorite can be described as a “fossil” of the solar system, that is, it is a fragment of an asteroid with very primitive properties, which formed at the beginning of the creation of the Solar System, with an approximate age of 4.56 billion years.
“We can point out that, since then, there have been no significant physical and chemical changes in its minerals, and they are almost in the same form as they were formed billions of years ago”, explained researcher Amanda Tosi. She stated that one of the focuses of the published work is how some minerals help to estimate the maximum temperature to which the rock was subjected, as well as the cooling rate of the asteroid body that gave rise to the meteorite. In this way, they are vestiges of what our early solar system was like and give us clues to how planetary bodies, asteroids and comets formed.
Stars rain
Amanda Tosi explained that the Santa Filomena meteorite can be classified as a chondrite, which are commonly found rocky meteorites. “What is unusual is the fact that parts of this meteorite hit an urban area, including the relatively large piece recovered for the National Museum/UFRJ.”
Another highlight, according to the astrophysicist and professor at the Valongo Observatory Diana Andrade, is the possibility of the meteor’s passage being documented by cameras, which made it possible to establish its trajectory and provided a better idea of where the pieces fell. . It was also possible to prove that the meteorite Santa Filomena came from the Asteroid Belt, which is between Mars and Jupiter. This fact was recorded for the first time in a meteorite fall in Brazil.
The Meteorites
The name of the group came up when Maria Elizabeth Zucolotto went to the field, along with “first-time sailors” Amanda Tosi and Diana Andrade, after a meteorite fell in Bahia, in the second half of 2017.
On the long journey they took, the researchers created a working group to find the “stones that fell from the sky”, which operates in all stages of the research, from field work to laboratory study and, above all, the dissemination of this information. science.
According to Professor Beth, “Research on meteorites has been carried out for some time, but few are dedicated to this branch of science in Brazil, especially women. It is one thing to be in the laboratory and receive a piece of a meteorite to do the analysis, but quite another to go out in the field to prospect and find these rare and important evidences of the universe”. She stated that she always seeks to encourage new researchers to find these records, which is quite an arduous task.
Publication of the study
The article was published in MaPS (Meteoritics & Planetary Science), an international monthly journal of planetary science published by the Meteoritical Society, an academic organization that promotes research and education in planetary science. An extensive study of mineralogy, chemistry and petrography was carried out to understand the formation processes and events that occurred before the meteorite reached Earth.
Reopening of the National Museum
According to Alexander Kellner, director of the National Museum, presenting a piece like this is very important for research, history and the collection. The institution has a collection of minerals of extreme relevance to science.
“This work, published in one of the main magazines in the area, shows, once again, that the National Museum’s professionals continue to generate quality research and establish partnerships, demonstrating that the institution is more alive than ever! large part of the Museum in the first months of 2026, exhibiting outstanding pieces, such as the Santa Filomena meteorite”, celebrates Kellner.
Regulation of ownership of meteorites
Another important aspect was who should own a meteorite. The race to Santa Filomena opened a discussion, which is being processed in the National Congress, on the regulation of ownership of meteorites that fall on Brazilian soil.
With the controversy, the Brazilian Society of Geology took action and, with the help of scientists and other interested parties, managed to propose a complement to the bill, which regulates that 20% of a new meteorite found, respecting the maximum limit than 1 kg, must be made available for science and deposited in a scientific institution.
This bill is currently being discussed in the National Congress. On the one hand, researchers who are reluctant against the sale and possession of meteorites, and, on the other hand, those who support the regulation, which can guarantee more Brazilian meteorites for research, since the law provides a percentage of the rock for science and releases the rest for trade.
“The sale of meteorite property regulated by law makes it impossible for them to leave the country illegally and indicates that there will be sufficient enforcement to prohibit smuggling. An example that we have close to a law that prohibits the sale is in Argentina, and, since then, ‘practically does not exist’ more Argentine meteorite, since the majority is taken clandestinely from the country and sold as if it had fallen somewhere else”, he explained. Zucolotto.