Planetary Sciences Division
Home Members Facility Publication Annual Report PLANEX
Chair: Dr. D.
Banerjee
Overview:
Our research programmes
involve the applications of stable and radioactive isotopes to characterize and
determine time scales of processes occurring in the early solar system.
Research Programmes:
1. Petrographic,
chemical and isotopic studies of Meteorites to understand cosmic ray exposure
and evolutionary history
2. Solar X-ray and fluorescence emission from Lunar Surface
3. Reflectance Spectroscopy of Terrestrial and Lunar samples
4. Isotope cosmochemistry and early solar system processes
5. Study of presolar grains to understand various
nucleosynthetic processes and stellar evolution
6.
Galactic chemical evolution
Facilities:
Inductively coupled
Plasma Mass Spectrometer (ICPMS)
Electron Microprobe
(EPMA)
X-ray Fluorescence
Spectrometer (XRF)
Secondary Ion Mass
Spectrometer (SIMS)
Nano Secondary
Ion Mass Spectrometer (NanoSIMS)
Multicollector
Inductively coupled Plasma Mass Spectrometer (MC-ICPMS)
Ph. D. Courses Offered:
Physics and Chemistry of the Solar
System
Isotopes in Planetary Science
Nuclear Physics and Applications
Numerical and Statistical Methods
List of Recent Publications:
1. Banerjee D. and Dewangan A., Simulation of the cosmic-ray induced
dose-rate within a Martian soil profile, Radiation Measurements, doi
10.1016/j.radmeas.2008.02.022., 2008.
2. Banerjee D. and Gasnault O., Hard-X rays and low-energy
gamma-rays from the Moon: Dependence of the continuum on the regolith
composition and the solar activity, J. Geophys. Res., doi:10.1029/2007JE003046,
2008.
3. Banerjee D., Thermoluminescence and optically stimulated
luminescence signals from volcanic ash: History of volcanism in Barren Island,
Andaman Sea, Quaternary Geochronology, doi:10.1016/j.quageo.2009.01.011, 2009.
4. Baroni M., Savarino J., Cole-Dai J., Rai V. K., Thiemens M. H., (2008) Mass-independent sulfur isotopic compositions of volcanic sulfate recorded in Antarctic ice cores over the last millennium. Journal of Geophysical Research (Atm) 113, D20112, doi: 1029/2008JD010185.
5. Das, J.P. and Murty, S.V.S., 2008, Nitrogen isotopes in chondrules: Signatures of precursors and formation processes, Current Science, v. 94, p. 485-489.
6. Frank J. Stadermann, Peter Hoppe, Christine Floss, Philipp R.
Heck, Friedrich Horz, Joachim Huth, Anton T. Kearsley, Jan Leitner, Kuljeet K.
Marhas, Kevin D. McKeegan, and Thomas Stephan (2008) Stardust in STARDUST - the
C, N, and O isotopic compositions of Wild 2 cometary matter in Al foil impacts.
Meteoritics & Planetary Science 43, 299-313.
7. Grossman L. , Simon S. B. , Rai V. K., Thiemens M. H., Hutcheon
I. D., Williams R. W. , Galy A., Ding T., Fedkin A. V., Clayton R. N., Mayeda
T. K. (2008) Primordial compositions of refractory inclusions. Geochimica et
Cosmochimica Acta 72, 3001–3021
8. Jadhav M., Amari S., Marhas K. K., Zinner E., Maruoka T.,
Gallino R. (2008) New stellar sources for high-density, presolar graphite
grains. The Astrophysical Journal 682, 1479.
9. Kearsley A. T., Borg J., Graham G. A., Burchell M. J., Cole M. J., Leroux H., Bridges J. C., Horz F., Wozniakiewicz P. J., Bland P. A., Bradley J. P., Dai Z. R., Teslich N., See T., Hoppe P., Heck P. R., Huth J., Stadermann F. J., Floss C., Marhas K., Stephan T., and Leitner J. (2008) Dust from comet Wild 2: Interpreting particle size, shape, structure and composition from impact features on the Stardust aluminum foils. Meteoritics & Planetary Science 43, 41-73.
10. Marhas K. K., Amari S., Gyngard F., Zinner E. and Gallino R. (2008) Iron and nickel isotopic ratios in presolar SiC grains. The Astrophysical latters 689, 622-645.
11. Sreekumar P., Acharya Y. B., Umapathy C. N., Ramakrishna Sharma M., Shanmugam, Tyagi A., Kumar, Vadawale S., Sudhakar M., Abraham L., Kulkani R., Purohit S., Premlatha R. L., Banerjee D., Bug M. and Goswami J. N., High Energy X-ray Spectrometer on Chandrayaan-1, Current Science, 96, 320-325, 2009.
12. Westphal A. J. et al. (2008) Discovery of non-random spatial distribution of impacts in the Stardust cometary collector. Meteoritics & Planetary Science 43, 415-429.