Editors’ Highlights are summaries of recent papers by AGU’s journal editors.
Source: Journal of Geophysical Research: Planets
In four years, NASA’s Psyche mission will arrive at asteroid 16 Psyche, a mysterious metallic-type (or M-type) asteroid that will be the first of its kind to be visited by a space mission. Observations of 16 Psyche’s surface suggest that it is highly metal-rich, but the bulk density of the asteroid is inconsistent with being totally made of metal. There are several hypotheses for Psyche’s origin and metallic spectra, including ferrovolcanism, which hypothesizes that metallic melts are squeezed out of the crystallizing core of the asteroid and erupt as lava flows on the surface.
Jorritsma and van Westrenen [2025] are the first scientists to look at whether ferrovolcanism is actually possible given what we know of the meteoritic precursors for Psyche’s composition. By calculating core sizes, compositions, and densities for different meteorite types the scientists calculate buoyancy forces and excess pressures to determine if the metallic liquid would be mobile enough to produce ferrovolcanism.
They found that some meteoritic compositions could produce ferrovolcanism while others could not. If NASA’s Psyche mission finds evidence of ferrovolcanism on the asteroid’s surface, these models can help constrain its early history and composition.
Citation: Jorritsma, J. J., & van Westrenen, W. (2025). Constraints on the feasibility of ferrovolcanism on asteroid 16 Psyche. Journal of Geophysical Research: Planets, 130, e2024JE008811. https://doi.org/10.1029/2024JE008811
—Laura Schaefer, Associate Editor, JGR: Planets