MORPHOLOGY AND PHYSICO-CHEMICAL CHARACTERISTICS OF AN IRON FRAGMENT FROM CHACO PROVINCE I.A. BUCURICA1,2, C. RADULESCU1,3*, A.A. POINESCU4*, I.V. POPESCU1,3,5, I.D. DULAMA1, C.M. NICOLESCU1, S. TEODORESCU1, M. BUMBAC3, G. PEHOIU6*, O. MURARESCU6 1 Valahia University of Targoviste, Institute of Multidisciplinary Research for Science and Technology, 130004 Targoviste, Romania; E-mail:
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[email protected] Received October 17, 2018 Abstract. This study aims to demonstrate that the investigated sample is nickel- rich, a signature of the meteorites composed of iron, in order to establish if studied sample belongs or not to Campo del Cielo meteorite group. The discrete structure found in meteorites is a fingerprint fully justified by structural analysis using optical microscopy (OM) and scanning electron microscopy (SEM), X-ray diffraction (XRD), as well as by elemental content using energy dispersive spectrometry (EDS) and inductive coupled plasma mass spectrometry (ICP-MS). The presence of crystalline phase’s kamacite and taenite was confirmed, with a good correlation between experimental results and standard diffraction data (i.e.