Magnetic Properties of Australasian Tektites From South China

South China, the northern part of the Australasian strewn field (AASF) of tektites and microtektites is located at the uprange of the hypothesized source crater that is still unconfirmed. Magnetic properties of impact glasses are an important indicator of their source materials and thermal history. Extensive magnetic investigations have been performed on various AASF tektites sampled from both the Indochina Peninsula and further south, but such information remains sparse for those sampled from South China. Here, we present a detailed rock magnetism study for both Muong Nong-type and splash-form AASF tektites from South China, showing that all the tektites have rather weak remanent magnetization, but ferromagnetic information can be extracted from their dominating paramagnetic signal. Signals caused by superparamagnetic particles are elusive, but those of single domain magnetite are detected in the splash-form tektites, and signals of pseudo-single domain magnetite are discovered in the Muong Nong-type tektites. Each morphological type of tektites from a same geographic area exhibits large dispersions in their magnetic properties. Across the entire AASF, the Muong Nong-type tektites from South China exhibit the lowest average magnetic susceptibility, and the splash-form tektites exhibit the smallest average natural remanent magnetization and ratio of equivalent magnetization. The observed heterogeneous magnetic properties are mainly caused by the different contents and sizes of magnetic particles, which can be explained by the different shock level and/or cooling history of the tektite melts. Micro-sized immiscible Fe-S spherules in the Muong Nong-type tektites from South China were likely originated from the pre-impact target.

Automated summary

This study presents a detailed rock magnetism analysis of tektites from South China, revealing their weak remanent magnetization but extractable ferromagnetic information from dominant paramagnetic signals. Tektites of different morphological types in the same geographic area exhibit large dispersions in magnetic properties, likely due to variations in the content and size of magnetic particles associated with different shock levels and/or cooling histories. Muong Nong-type tektites from South China exhibit the lowest average magnetic susceptibility, while splash-form tektites display the smallest average natural remanent magnetization and equivalent magnetization ratio across the entire study area.