ALH – an abbreviation used for meteorites from Allan Hills.
Allan Hills 84001 – is an exotic meteorite from Mars that does not fit into any of the SNC groups and was thought to contain evidence for life on Mars.
Allende meteorite – is the largest carbonaceous chondrite ever found on Earth.
Amphoterite – an obsolete classification of chondritic meteorites that are now classified as LL.
Chondrite – stony meteorites unmodified by melting or differentiation of the parent body
Chondrule – millimetre-scale round grains found in chondrites
Clan – meteorites that are not similar enough to form a group, but are also not too different from each other to be put in separate classes.[1]
Class – two or more groups that have a similar chemistry and oxygen isotope ratios.[1]
Compositional type – a classification based on overall composition, for example stony, iron, stony-iron (as introduced by Maskelyne). Can also refer to the composition deduced from spectroscopy of asteroids.
Condensation – the process of chemicals changing from the gaseous to the solid phase during the cooling of the protoplanetary disk.
Fall – a meteorite that was seen while it fell to Earth and found.
Find – a meteorite that was found without seeing it fall.
Fossil meteorite – a meteorite that was buried under layers of sediment before the start of the Quaternaryperiod. Some or all of the original cosmic material has been replaced by diagenetic minerals.[3]: 320 (It is, however, not a fossil).
Fusion crust – a coating on meteorites that forms during their passage through the atmosphere.
Neumann lines (or Neumann bands) – a pattern of fine parallel lines seen in some iron meteorites, thought to be due to impact events on the parent body
Nonmagmatic meteorite – (deprecated) iron meteorites that were thought to have not formed by igneous processes.
Panspermia – the hypothesis that life could reach other planets by the means of meteorites and/or comets.
Parent body – the celestial body from which originates a meteorite or a class of meteorites.
Petrologic type – a classification scheme that expresses the degree to which a meteorite has been affected by the secondary processes of thermal metamorphism and aqueous alteration on the parent asteroid.
Regmaglypts – thumbprint-sized indentations in the surface of larger meteorites formed by ablation as the meteorite passes through a planet's atmosphere, probably caused by vortices of hot gas.[6]
Superbolide – is a bolide that reaches an apparent magnitude of −17 or brighter, which is roughly 100 times brighter than the full moon. Recent examples of superbolides include the Sutter's Mill meteorite and the Chelyabinsk meteor.
Tamdakht – a meteorite that fell near Ouarzazate, Morocco on 2008-12-20 producing a strewn field of approximately 25 km (16 mi) by 2 km (1.2 mi) and two small impact craters.
Tektite – glassy terrestrial debris created by meteorite impacts.
^Schmitz, B.; Tassinari, M. (2001), "Fossil Meteorites", in Peucker-Ehrenbrink, B.; Schmitz, B. (eds.), Accretion of Extraterrestrial Matter Throughout Earth's History, New York: Springer, pp. 319–31, doi:10.1007/978-1-4419-8694-8_17, ISBN978-1-4613-4668-5
