Want a big piece of Mars? This can be yours – $ 4m for us

Want a big piece of Mars? This can be yours – $ 4m for us

For sale: A 25 kg rock. Estimated auction price: $ 2 million to $ 4 million US. why so expensive? It is the largest piece of Mars found on Earth.

There will be a Sothabi auction in New York which is known as NWA 16788 on Wednesday as part of a natural history-theme sales, including a teenage seratosorus dinosaur skeleton that is more than two meters long and about three meters long.

According to the auction house, the meteorite is believed to have been blown from the surface of Mars by a large -scale asteroid strike before traveling on Earth at a distance of 225 million kilometers, where it crashed in Sahara. A meteorite hunter found it in Niger in November 2023, says Sothabi.

Sothabi states that red, brown and brown hunk is about 70 percent larger than the next largest piece of Mars found on Earth and currently represents about seven percent of all martian materials on the planet, Sothabi says. It measures about 375 millimeters up to 279 millimeters up to 152 millimeters.

“This is the largest piece of Martian meteorite Mars, which we have found with a long shot,” said Sothabi’s science and natural history vice -president Cassandra Haton.

It is also a rare discovery. Sothabi states that out of over 77,000 officially recognized meteorites are only 400 Martian meteorites, which say Sothabi.

A man with gloves with a large rock on a performance.
A handler conducts the biggest known piece of Mars on Mars on Earth, during media preview of the natural history auction of Sothabi in New York City on 8 July. (Eduardo Munoz/Reuters)

Haton said that a small piece of red planet was removed and sent to a particular laboratory that confirmed that it was from Mars. He said that it was compared in 1976 with a specific chemical composition of the martian meteorites discovered during the Viking Space Investigation.

The examination found that it is a “Olivin-Micrrogabbric Shergotite”, a type of martian rock formed from the slow cooling of the Martian magma. It has a course-dancing texture and includes mineral pieroxin and olivin, says Sothabi.

Haton said that it also contains a glassy surface, due to high heat that burns it when it fell through the Earth’s atmosphere, Haton said. “So this was his first clue that it was not just a big rock on the ground,” he said.

The meteorite was previously performed at the Italian Space Agency in Rome. Sothabi did not disclose the owner.

It is not clear that when the meteorite collides with the Earth, but the test suggests that it was probably in recent years, Sothabi said.

Dino auction

Juvenile Seratosorus Nasisornis Skeleton was found in 1996, near YO, in Bone Cabin Quarry, in a gold mine for dinosaur bones. Experts stated that experts assembled and mounted about 140 fossil bones with some sculpture materials to recreate the skeleton, so it is ready to display, Sothabi says.

The skeleton is believed to be about 150 million years ago since late Jurassic period, Sothabi says. Its auction estimates $ 4 million to $ 6 million US.

Ceratosaurus dinosaurs were bipoled with small arms that appear similar to the Tyrannosaurus Rex, but were small. Ceratosaurus dinosaurs can grow up to 7.6 meters, while tyrannosaurus rex can be 12 meters long.

The skeleton was acquired last year acquired by phoselogic, a Utah-based fossil preparation and growing company.

Wednesday’s auction is part of Sothabi’s Geek Week 2025 and includes 122 items, including other meteorites, fossils, and gem-quality minerals.

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