On 8 January 2014, an object later known as CNEOS 2014-01-08 impacted the Earth off the north coast of Papua New Guinea. Based upon the speed and trajectory of this object, it was suggested by some planetary scientists that its original trajectory had been incompatible with a Solar System object, and that therefore it may have originated outside our Solar System. While this was never universally accepted, the potential for scientists to gain direct access to fragments of an extra-Solar object was sufficient that in 2023 an expedition was sent to the area to collect samples.
This expedition recovered over 800 particles of potential extraterrestrial origin, about 80% of which were subsequently identified as pieces of S-type, I-type, and G-type chondritic meteorite (such particles are not unusual in deep-marine sediments, where the absence of much input from land means that the tiny amounts of meteoric material which fall all over the Earth can build up over time to form a detectable portion of local sediments). The remaining particles appeared to belong to an entirely new type of meteoric material, which were named D-type particles, which had an unusually low ration of magnesium to iron compared to other meteoric material. Within these D-type particles, a small subset was identified which were also enriched in the elements barium, lanthanum, and uranium, a highly unusual combination of elements, furthering speculation that these objects were of genuinely unique origin.
However, the area where CNEOS 2014-01-08 impacted the Earth also lies within the Australasian Tektite Strewn Field, an area which covers about 15% of the planet's surface, from Southeast Asia through the western Pacific to Australia and Antarctica. This field is thought to have formed by the impact of an extraterrestrial object about 790 000 years ago, probably somewhere in Southest Asia (although the impact site has never been found). Across this area tektites and microtektites (spherical particles formed when rock vaporised during an impact recondenses in the atmosphere) with a distinctive high copper, nickel, and chromium profile are found. These tektites are thought to be comprised largely of terrestrial surface mater vaporised during the impact, with the additional cobalt, nickel, and chromium potentially coming from the impacting object). However, a full-spectrum analysis, comparing the elemental make-up of the Australasian Tektites to the BeLaU spherules has not previously been made.
In a paper published on the arXiv pre-print archive at Cornell University on 15 October 2025, Eugenia Hyung, Emma Levy, Loralei Cook, and Stein Jacobsen of the Department of Earth and Planetary Science at Harvard University, Abraham Loeb of the Department of Astronomy at Harvard University, and Jayden Squire and Juraj Farkas of the Department of Earth Sciences at the University of Adelaide, present the results of a study in which the chemistry of BeLaU spherules was compared to that of Australasian Tektites.
Hyung et al. used four Australasian Tektites from the collection of the Tate Museum in Adelaide, two from Florieton in South Australia, one from Charlotte Waters in the Northern Territory, and one from Kalgoorlie in Western Australia. Between 50 and 100 mg of material was taken from each sample, crushed in a pestle and mortar, then dissolved in a mixture of hydrofluoric acid and nitric acid, dried down, then redissolved in hydrochloric acid. A sample of the resultant solution was then analysed for 55 elements using a ThermoFisher Scientific iCAP TQ triple quadrupole ICP mass spectrometer. The results from this analysis were then compared to previous analyses of BeLaU spherules, as well as the average upper continental crust, and previous results for Australasian Strewn Field deep-sea microtektites.
The four tektite samples were all similar to one another (there was some variant in calcium content. as well as being similar to the microtektite samples. Compared to the average upper continental crust, they were slightly enriched in rare earth elements, but depleted in copper, zinc, arsenic, molybdenum, antimony, thallium, lead, and bismuth. Australasian tektites have previously been observed to be depleted in thallium, lead, and bismuth, something which has been attributed to loss of volatile fractions during the impact event.
While the Australasian tektites were depleted in molybdenum, BeLaU spherules are enriched in this element. BeLaU spherules are also notably more enriched in the heavier rare earth elements. Where the BeLaU spherules are enriched in beryllium and uranium, no such enrichment could be seen in the Australasian tektites. Based upon this, Hyung et al. conclude that these are in fact to different classes of objects, with different origins.
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