A Mössbauer spectral study of the Jilin meteorite

The iron‐57 Mössbauer spectra of three different samples of the Jilin meteorite have been measured at 78 and 295 K. Five iron containing major components are identified, two magnetic components, kamacite and troilite, and three non‐magnetic components, olivine, pyroxene, and an iron(III) component. The relative absorption areas of these five components show that sample A contains a larger fraction of magnetic components, ca. 50 percent, than samples B and C, which contain ca. 30 percent. This difference indicates a significant compositional inhomogeneity in the Jilin meteorite. The fit of the troilite component sextet is extensively discussed in the paper and requires the adjustment of not only the isomer shift and hyperfine field, but also of the quadrupole interaction, the asymmetry parameter of the electric field gradient tensor, and the orientation of the hyperfine field in the principal axes of the electric field gradient tensor. The smaller isomer shift and hyperfine field of the kamacite mineral in sample B indicate that this sample contains less nickel than the kamacite in samples A and C, in which the amount of nickel is estimated to be ca. 9 percent. On the basis of its hyperfine parameters, the iron(III) component is assigned to iron(III) substituted on the M1 site of pyroxene.