{"id":131816,"date":"2026-11-03T15:07:52","date_gmt":"2026-11-03T09:37:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/?p=131816"},"modified":"2026-11-03T15:09:01","modified_gmt":"2026-11-03T09:39:01","slug":"teghaza-001","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/teghaza-001\/","title":{"rendered":"Teghaza 001: 4.1-Billion-Year-Old Mars Meteorite Found in Sahara Desert"},"content":{"rendered":"<h2><b>Teghaza 001 Latest News<\/b><\/h2>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">A rose-coloured meteorite discovered in the Sahara Desert in 2022 named Teghaza 001 has turned out to be one of the oldest pieces of Mars ever found on Earth. <\/span><\/p>\n<h2><b>About Teghaza 001<\/b><\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It is a <\/span><b>rose-coloured meteorite discovered <\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">in the <\/span><b>Sahara Desert <\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">in <\/span><b>2022<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The meteorite was <\/span><b>named after<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> the<\/span><b> Teghaza salt plain in Mali<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">, where it was discovered.<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It is<\/span><b> among roughly 435 Martian meteorites identified on Earth <\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">and is considered <\/span><b>one of the three most ancient samples of the Red Planet<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> found so far.<\/span>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The other two among the three most ancient Martian meteorites found on Earth are ALH84001 and a sample nicknamed Black Beauty.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The meteorite weighs nearly 800 grams.\u00a0<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It <\/span><b>dates back <\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">more than<\/span><b> 4.1 billion yea<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">rs, when the <\/span><b>mineral zircon crystallized from molten magma<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> on Mars.\u00a0<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Because zircon allows exceptionally precise radiometric dating, this immediately placed the meteorite alongside the two other Martian remnants of a similar age.\u00a0<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Analysis showed that Teghaza 001\u2019s texture and composition do not match any other known meteorite group.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">What impressed researchers most was the<\/span><b> presence of chemical markers indicating <\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">that the <\/span><b>rock had been in contact with liquid water during its formation<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> and evolution.\u00a0<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">This makes Teghaza 001 a direct <\/span><b>witness to an era when Mars was wet <\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">and potentially suitable for life to emerge.\u00a0<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h2><b>Meteoroid, a meteor, or meteorite?<\/b><\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"text-align: justify;\"><b>Meteoroids<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">: Meteoroids are <\/span><b>bits of solid material<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> of different sizes <\/span><b>orbiting the Sun.\u00a0\u00a0<\/b><\/li>\n<li style=\"text-align: justify;\"><b>Meteors When meteoroids enter Earth\u2019s atmosphere<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> (or that of another planet, like Mars) at <\/span><b>high speed and burn up<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">, the<\/span><b> fireballs, or \u201cshooting stars,\u201d<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> are <\/span><b>called meteors.<\/b><\/li>\n<li style=\"text-align: justify;\"><b>Meteorites: When a meteoroid survives a trip through the atmosphere<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> and <\/span><b>hits the ground<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">, it\u2019s called a meteorite.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><b>News: <\/b><a href=\"https:\/\/www.livemint.com\/science\/news\/martian-meteorite-found-in-sahara-is-4-1-billion-years-old-what-nasa-funded-scientists-discovered-11793634563278.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\"><b>LM<\/b><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Teghaza 001, a rose-coloured Martian meteorite discovered in Mali&#8217;s Sahara Desert, dates back over 4.1 billion years. Identified as one of the oldest known meteorites from Mars, the rock contains chemical evidence of past water interaction, offering insights into the Red Planet&#8217;s ancient environment.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":23,"featured_media":131796,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[11328],"class_list":["post-131816","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-upsc-prelims-current-affairs","tag-teghaza-001","no-featured-image-padding"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/131816","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/23"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=131816"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/131816\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":131879,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/131816\/revisions\/131879"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/131796"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=131816"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=131816"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=131816"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}