MMESSH - Utilising Meteorite Magnetism to Elucidate Early Solar System History

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Within just 5-10 million years following the ignition of a star, the turbulent protoplanetary disk of dust and gas that surrounds this young celestial object can transform into an organised system of planetary bodies. This transition progresses via an elaborate series of processes, the variable natures of which act to establish the essential properties of each planet that dictate its long-term evolution. Cutting-edge models demonstrate that the early stages in this sequence are mediated by the styles and rates with which gas, micrometre-scale dust, millimetre-scale solids, and centimetre-scale aggregates move through a disk. Hence, the dynamic properties of a disk act as the foundation of planet building, with the legacy of these motions being felt in essentially every aspect of a planet's behaviour over its lifetime, including its ability to support life. Despite its importance, the dynamic properties of the disk that formed our solar system - primarily the locations of solid formation and accretion of the first planetary bodies - are critically poorly constrained, limiting our basic understanding of how and why planets exhibit their wealth of observed behaviours. In this project, I will utilise pioneering measurements, novel samples, and sophisticated models of the magnetic field that threaded our disk to uncover this pivotal spatial information from the magnetic records carried by meteorites. Combined with pre-existing isotopic compositions, this knowledge will unlock the essential dynamic properties of our disk, enabling me to address the gaps that exist in our current models of planet building. Hence, MMESSH will culminate in a next-generation model of this process rooted in a step change in our understanding of its fundamental stages, which I will employ to explore with unprecedented depth and clarity the origins of the diverse behaviours exhibited by planets in our solar system and beyond, and the early processes that led to Earth fostering complex life.