A meteorite recovery project was started in 2001 in the Sultanate of Oman. The 20 search campaigns conducted in Oman and Saudi Arabia have yielded several thousand samples of meteorites corresponding to approximately 1000 fall events. All recovered samples (typically about 100 per field season) are classified or verified for pairing in case of large strewn fields. Besides detailed analysis of the rare meteorites found (e.g. ureilites, Mars meteorites) the project is focused on understanding the process of meteorite accumulation and -weathering in a hot desert. For this purpose, new analytical facilities for the quantification of cosmogenic isotopes (14C, 22Na, 26Al, possibly 44Ti) have been built up in collaboration with the Physics Institute of the University of Bern. The large number of meteorites represented in the collection of this project is also used to establish the composition of the meteorite flux over the past several 10’000 years and to compare this with the population of observed fall events.
Another meteorite project is the study of the recently recognized Twannberg strewn field (IIG iron meteorite) in the Swiss Jura north of the Lake of Biel. The size and timing of this fall event and its relation with Quaternary sediments is currently being investigated and different analytical approaches to verify pairing of new finds with Twannberg are tested.
