SKU: 23913735627

Aletai Iron Meteorite Slice, IIIE-an, 161.49g, Etched Widmanstatten Pattern

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Description

Aletai Iron Meteorite Slice, IIIE-an, 161.49g, Etched Widmanstatten PatternA 161. 49g Aletai slice, etched on both sides This 161. 49g slice comes from one of the iron masses of the Aletai meteorite. It has been cut from the mass, polished, and etched on both faces, so the Widmanstatten pattern reads across the full length of the cross section. Aletai is an iron meteorite of the anomalous IIIE group, metal that crystallized deep in the core of a differentiated asteroid and cooled across millions of years, long enough for

A 161.49g Aletai slice, etched on both sides

This 161.49g slice comes from one of the iron masses of the Aletai meteorite. It has been cut from the mass, polished, and etched on both faces, so the Widmanstatten pattern reads across the full length of the cross section. Aletai is an iron meteorite of the anomalous IIIE group, metal that crystallized deep in the core of a differentiated asteroid and cooled across millions of years, long enough for kamacite and taenite to settle into the interlocking arrangement the etch later draws out.

Etching relies on a simple difference: dilute acid removes kamacite faster than taenite. The taenite is left raised in slight relief, and that relief is what the eye registers as the bright geometric bands. Both faces of this slice show the pattern, and the natural exterior edges of the original mass remain around the cut.

What the etch shows

Each band marks a kamacite plate that grew along a face of an octahedron set within the surrounding taenite, so the lines repeat at fixed angles wherever they cross the surface. For Aletai, the kamacite bandwidth recorded in the Meteoritical Bulletin runs about 0.9 to 1.0 mm, the figure that governs how the banding scales on the etched face.

Darker seams and patches interrupt the metal here and there, and a fracture runs through the slice with light oxidation along it. The petrography on file for Aletai records schreibersite, troilite, daubreelite, and haxonite as minor phases among the kamacite and taenite, and features of that sort sit within the metal. Their exact placement belongs to this 161.49g slice alone, so what the photographs show is the piece you receive.

Found in the Altay, paired across a strewn field

The Aletai irons were recovered from the Altay region of the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region in northern China, beginning with a mass found in 1898. More were located across the same region in the century that followed and were catalogued under separate local names, among them Armanty, Wuxilike, Akebulake, and Ulasitai. Analysis of the metal later tied these irons together as paired, the scattered remains of a single fall.

The Meteoritical Society unified those paired masses under the one official name Aletai in 2016 and retired the earlier names as synonyms. They lie along a northwest to southeast line of roughly 425 km across China, placing Aletai among the longest strewn fields recorded for any meteorite. This slice was cut from that fall, which was submitted to the Meteoritical Bulletin by Weibiao Xu and John T. Wasson.

An iron set apart within group IIIE

Chemical groups for iron meteorites come from trace element measurements in the metal, taken by neutron activation analysis and weighed against the etch structure. Aletai belongs to group IIIE, but it is recorded as anomalous, written IIIE-an, since its chemistry stands outside the normal IIIE range. It carries the highest gold content among IIIE irons on record, with iridium above the level the group trend predicts.

As of June 2026, the Meteoritical Bulletin lists Aletai as 1 of 2 approved meteorites classified as Iron, IIIE-an. Irons of this kind are the metal cores of asteroids that melted early in solar system history, separated into metal and rock, and were later broken apart in collisions. For a fuller account of how the structure forms, see our guide to the Widmanstatten pattern explained. The Meteoritical Society keeps the official record of meteorite names and classifications.

Frequently asked questions

Is this a classified specimen? Yes. Aletai is listed in the Meteoritical Bulletin as an anomalous IIIE iron (IIIE-an) from Xinjiang, China, and the classification can be checked against the official entry. The slice ships with a Treasure Coast Meteorite Co. certificate of authenticity that documents its classification and provenance.

What does the an in IIIE-an mean? IIIE is a chemical group of iron meteorites set by trace element composition. The an marks the meteorite as anomalous, meaning Aletai sits outside the ordinary IIIE range while still being grouped with it.

What is included? You receive the 161.49g Aletai slice, etched on both faces, along with a certificate of authenticity. A display stand is not included unless the listing notes one. The cube in a photograph is a 1 cm scale reference and is not part of the sale.

How was the slice finished? It was cut from the parent mass, polished, and etched with dilute acid on both faces. Since the acid takes kamacite faster than taenite, the etched surface keeps the relief that brings the Widmanstatten pattern into view.

What care does an iron meteorite need? Iron can rust in damp conditions. Keep the slice in a dry spot, limit handling of the etched faces, and store it with silica gel desiccant. A thin protective coating is a common way to preserve the contrast of the etch.

A note for collectors

This slice brings together a published anomalous IIIE classification, an etched Widmanstatten structure, and a strewn-field history that leads back to a documented source, which is the pairing of display and provenance that many collectors look for. At 161.49g it suits a shelf or cabinet and still shows the full pattern on both faces.

It is offered by Treasure Coast Meteorite Co., IMCA Member #3323, with documented classification and provenance. Further classified irons appear in our Iron Meteorites collection.

Meteoritical Bulletin entry: Aletai | Classification: Iron meteorite (IIIE-an) | Find, Xinjiang China, 1898

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SKU: 23913735627

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J
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Joseph
West Palm Beach, US
★★★★★ 5
An interesting look at capitalism in the US
Format: Hardcover
Seller: Product arrived on time in good condition. No issues with the seller at all! Book: This is a pretty dense history of the US through the lense of capitalism. There are quite a few editing errors (typos, incorrect quotation formatting, etc) that are speed bumps to the flow of this book but don’t ruin the reading experience. There are also a few moments where a subjective claim is made using a historical event as a backdrop, but the claim isn’t elaborated on as well as it could be. I chalk this up to the focus of the book being on history and not economics, but I do think if a claim is made it would be interesting to have more data as to why the claim was made.
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Reviewed in the United States on December 5, 2023
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Gary Moreau, Author
Boise, US
★★★★★ 4
Marx had the proletariat, Mao had the farmers, America has the owners of financial capital
Format: Kindle
What makes Jonathan Levy’s book so informative is that it is truly a parallel history of its politics and its economics. And only by viewing these two intertwined paths side by side can you truly understand the myth of the American free market. America’s politics and its economics have never, since the country’s founding, been separated. The state has been an integral part of everything economic to an extent that would make the most rabid socialist gasp in horror. The only difference is that while the Marxist state stood side by side with the proletariat, and Mao built the number two economy in the world on the support of farmers, America built its economic marvel on the backs of, and for the benefit of, the owners of financial capital. That’s not all bad, mind you. It takes workers, farmers, and the owners of capital to build a modern economy. The tension comes when there is a lack of balance between the importance the state attaches to each. And there can be little surprise that America’s politicians have put the owners of financial capital at the top of their list of priorities. Politicians, after all, can do nothing without power, and power comes via the electoral process, a process that is today fueled by obscene amounts of money. And who has all that money? The American economic narrative is a misleading tale of meritocracy and free markets. The Horatio Alger-based myth is that you are only limited by your skills and your ambition. And like most enduring myths there is a thread of truth to it. Many successful people truly deserve what they have achieved. But does anyone really possess $150 billion of personal merit? Can we statistically accept that the wealthiest nation in the world is also one of the most financially unequal without seeing a pattern of bias? Perhaps the most selectively quoted book in history is Adam Smith’s “Wealth of Nations”, published, strangely enough, in 1776. Often credited with being the father of capitalism, Smith argued that markets free of excessive regulation would be more efficient than markets that were overly regulated, although Smith “made no categorical separation between the political and the economic, or state and market.” Smith did, however, warn against the socially destructive power of monopolies, which unregulated markets will not protect against, and he correctly predicted that the excessive division of labor would lead to a degree of labor and wealth inequity that would destroy society. At the time when US Steel, General Electric, and General Motors, among many others, were the power behind America’s global economic hegemony, most Americans earned a living through wages. And those wages were made possible by long term fixed investments that created jobs. They were generally big bets that took a long time to earn a return but that aligned with the jobs-first priorities of most companies. (Employees first, communities second, shareholders a distant third.) And while not every employee enjoyed the same salary, the differences between the top earners and the average earners was a fraction of what it is today. That era, of course, is long over. The current economy is geared toward the creation of wealth through the short-term investment in assets that will appreciate rapidly and are highly liquid. At the moment that is the stock market and synthetic financial tools pedaled by hedge funds, banks, and the like. The problem is that the wage market encompassed much of America. The asset appreciation market encompasses only a tiny sliver of the richest among us. There is spillover, of course. The lawyers, analysts, consultants, bankers, and sales people who serve the asset appreciation market are doing quite well. But the man or woman who has less education and who might have made a decent living in a steel mill or car assembly plant, has lost out. And despite what the politicians will tell you, the gap is getting wider. (I spent a career in corporate industry, have a college degree in economics, have been a CEO, and have served on four public company boards. I know enough to know that Levy knows what he’s talking about.) The second important point to come out of all this is that economics is not really a “science” as most people think of that term. There is a shared jargon and there are commonly accepted principles. The very idea that there is an economy that is distinct from all other aspects of human existence, including the state, however, is a relatively recent concept. The weakness of the distinction, in fact, is clearly demonstrated by the remarkable reality of just how diverse the history of the American economy is. The sun doesn’t always rise in the east in the world of economics. In each of the economic eras Levy describes it is stunning how few people actually formulated the thinking that defined them. I will join some of the other reviewers in suggesting that the author could have spent more time explaining some of the jargon inevitably found in a treatise on economics. The layman obviously wasn’t his target audience but the book, I believe, could have read more smoothly and been much, much shorter. (The editor and publisher have to take some of the blame for this.) Even if you have to slog your way through the more tedious sections on global capital flows and such, however, you’ll get something from the book even if you’ve never set foot in an economics classroom. If you get no more than the fact that the free market is a myth and that most long term capital that actually creates jobs and income for the average American is actually provided by you, the taxpayer, not the Wall Street capitalist, you will better understand why there is so much division in our country right now. We don’t have a democratic economy. The young wonders of Silicon Valley would have nothing if it wasn’t for your tax dollars and your pension plan, if you’re still lucky enough to have one. We can do better. We have to. The economic inequity we have now is simply not sustainable.
WAS THIS REVIEW HELPFUL?YesReportShare
Reviewed in the United States on August 19, 2022
J
Verified Purchase
Jose Calderon
Louisville, US
★★★★★ 5
Good value for the money.
Format: Hardcover
Book in excellent condition, delivered promptly.
WAS THIS REVIEW HELPFUL?YesReportShare
Reviewed in the United States on May 20, 2025
J
Verified Purchase
Jared Dean
Grantham, US
★★★★★ 5
Great read.
Format: Paperback
Gives a great perspective of how technology has developed and shaped the economy.
WAS THIS REVIEW HELPFUL?YesReportShare
Reviewed in the United States on January 21, 2024
J
Verified Purchase
james hammill
Cuba, US
★★★★★ 5
How Capitalism Shaped America
Format: Hardcover
Very impressive analysis. Unfortunately the author ended his analysis in 2010. Wish he had offered some thoughts on what should be done as opposed to what is being done in this age of economic chaos.
WAS THIS REVIEW HELPFUL?YesReportShare
Reviewed in the United States on August 19, 2021

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