7:30 PM Presentation
Ca-Al rich inclusions (CAIs), among the earliest condensates of our solar system, are a unique record of early solar system conditions and processes. Several studies have demonstrated that CAIs likely survived significant post-condensation heating event(s) prior to incorporation into their host meteorites, and that these processes caused significant evaporation of the pristine CAIs, as well as alteration of their original elemental and isotopic compositions.

I am currently applying Si and Mg isotope measurements using an ion probe instrument to the study of isotopic fractionation within specific CAIs. Determination of the fractionation of and relationship between Mg and Si within individual CAIs, alongside an understanding of the fractionation behavior of these elements in CAI-like melts permits us to better constrain the post-condensation processes which affected these materials such as CAI processing in the early solar system. We can also begin to realistically reconstruct and interpret the original isotopic compositions of these early solar system materials.

Bio Sketch
Kim B. Knight is a Postdoctoral Research Associate with the Chicago Center for Cosmochemistry at the Department of the Geophysical Sciences at the University of Chicago and Argonne National Laboratory. She obtained her Ph.D. in Earth and Planetary Sciences in 2006 and joined the Chicago group in June 2006. She is working on application of resonant ionization mass spectrometry techniques to isotopic problems in presolar grains to better constrain stellar conditions and nucelosynthesis in stars, as well as stable isotope (ion probe) determinations of early solar system condensates such as Ca-Al-rich inclusions, records of early solar system events and processes.