micrometeoroid
Sign in to savethumb|250px|Micrometeorite, collected from the Antarctic snow, was a micrometeoroid before it entered the Earth's atmosphere A micrometeoroid is a tiny meteoroid: a small particle of rock in space, usually weighing less than a gram. A micrometeorite is such a particle that survives passage through Earth's atmosphere and reaches Earth's surface.
~8 min read
Article
9 sectionsContents
- Origins and orbits
- Historical studies
- Velocities
- Flux
- Effect on spacecraft operations
- Spacecraft micrometeoroid shielding
- Footnotes
- See also
- External links
thumb|250px|Micrometeorite, collected from the Antarctic snow, was a micrometeoroid before it entered the Earth's atmosphere A micrometeoroid is a tiny meteoroid: a small particle of rock in space, usually weighing less than a gram. A micrometeorite is such a particle that survives passage through Earth's atmosphere and reaches Earth's surface.
The term "micrometeoroid" was officially deprecated in 2017 by the International Astronomical Union, the primary international association of astronomers, as redundant to "meteoroid." It remains in use in astronautical engineering to refer to small, difficult to detect objects that can impact and damage spacecraft.