NanoPaleoMagnetism

I couldn’t resist posting this tantalising first image obtained by new group member Josh Einsle – a 3D reconstruction at the nanometre scale of metallic iron particles inside a grain of dusty olivine from the Semarkona meteorite. The image represents a 9.6 µm by 8.0 µm by 5.24 µm volume (red numbers are in nm), that has been sliced through and imaged every 20 nm using a dual-beam FIB. From this reconstruction we aim to extract particle sizes and shapes, and use these as input into micromagnetic simulations. This will allow us to fully characterise the remanence carrying potential of these grains and ultimately lead to a quantitative model of their paleomagnetic properties.

Fe nanoparticles in dusty olivine: carriers of magnetic signals from the early solar system?