2023-07-06 13:18:41
A team of researchers from Félix-Houphouët-Boigny University, Aix-Marseille University, IRD, and SODEMI announces the discovery of a ” scientific treasure in the center-east of the country, in the gold zone. Just over 800 tektites have been found and will be analyzed. Dating from a little over a million years ago, these tektites are fragments of rock melted and expelled by the impact of a meteorite, in this case having taken place in Ghana.
Published on: 06/07/2023 – 13:18
With our correspondent in Abidjan, Fraçois Hume-Ferkatadji
In Côte d’Ivoire, they have been renamed “ivoirites”. These beads of black, pearly rocks, made of glass, are rare objects sought after by scientists: they allow us to learn more about the consequences of asteroid collisions with our planet. The Ivorian tektite field had been known since the 1930s and research had then led to the discovery of around thirty of these objects. Then dozens of others over the years that followed, without being analyzed.
The study made it possible to discover 174 new ivoirites: in all, there are now just over 800. They will be classified, listed, analyzed and exhibited at the FHB university.
The populations around Ouellé and Bougouanou, in the Daoukro region, helped the researchers to find these rock chips, in particular, the gold miners. Pebbles that traveled more than 300 km before landing in the center-east of Côte d’Ivoire.
1.07 million years ago, a meteorite ended its course south of Kumasi in Ghana. The impact formed Lake Bosumtwi, a crater 10 km in diameter. ” The inclined angle of the meteorite impact may explain the distribution of tektites in this direction explains Petanki Soro, the doctoral student behind this study.
The Ivorian field of tektites is unique in Africa: there are four others in the rest of the world. According to the IRD, this is a unique and little-known scientific heritage.
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