Material from outer space will find its way to labs at the Arkansas Center for Space and Planetary Sciences so that researchers can study their composition and age. This work will provide new insights into the formation and history of comets.

Graduate students Fatemeh Sedaghatpour and Jonathan Craig have received a three-year, $421,091 grant from NASA to perform thermoluminescence studies on samples returned from the Stardust mission in 2006. Using thermoluminescence, they will measure the light produced by heating samples, which provides information on the age and composition of the particles.The researchers will look at two different types of thermoluminescence - natural and induced. Natural thermoluminescence is produced from a sample in its "as received" state and provides information on the radiation exposure age of the material, or "how long it has been floating around out there," Craig said. Induced thermoluminescence is produced by a sample drained of its natural thermoluminescence by momentarily heating the sample to a high temperature, then exposing it to a known radiation source. The information gleaned from this technique includes the history of heating, cooling and crystallization of the material in the sample.

After the thermoluminescence studies, the researchers will transfer the particles to a scanning electron microscope, which provides a high-magnification image of the material. They also use an energy dispersive X-ray device attached to the microscope that allows them to proportionally determine the percentages of the chemical elements present in the sample.