Overview

• NWA 16788 weighs 54 pounds (24.5 kg), making it the largest known fragment of Mars ever recovered on Earth since its November 2023 discovery in Niger’s Agadez region.
• Sotheby’s New York will auction the specimen on July 16 with a $2 million to $4 million estimate that could establish a new record for meteorite sales.
• Analysis shows a glassy fusion crust and unique mineralogy formed when an asteroid impact blasted the rock off Mars and heated parts of it into glass.
• Only about 400 Martian meteorites have been documented, and this single piece accounts for almost 7 percent of all Martian material ever found on the planet.
• A reference sample has been preserved at China’s Purple Mountain Observatory even as scientists and collectors debate the balance between private ownership and public research.