Do you want to keep a piece of Mars in your home? If yes, then you can get a Martian meteorite through an auction. A Martian stone weighing 54 pounds (25 kg) will be auctioned. Its estimated auction price can be from 20 lakh to 40 lakh dollars (Rs 17.2 crore to Rs 34.4 crore). The question is, why is this stone, which is a meteorite, so expensive? This is the largest piece of Mars found on Earth to date.

Who will auction it?

Auction company Sotheby's in New York will auction this meteorite (called NWA 16788) on Wednesday, July 16, under an auction based on the Natural History theme. Along with this, Sotheby's will also auction the skeleton of a juvenile Ceratosaurus Dinosaur, which is more than 6 feet (2 meters) long and about 11 feet (3 meters) long.

Where was this meteorite found?

According to Sotheby's, the meteorite is believed to have been separated from the surface of Mars by a large asteroid and then traveled a distance of 140 million miles (225 million kilometers) to Earth, where it fell in the Sahara. According to Sotheby's, a meteorite explorer found it in Niger in November 2023.

How big is this meteorite

According to Sotheby's, this piece of red, brown and gray is about 70% larger than the second-largest piece of Mars found on Earth. It measures about 15 inches X 11 inches X 6 inches (375 millimeters X 279 millimeters X 152 millimeters).

Sotheby's says that of the more than 77,000 officially recognized meteorites found on Earth, only 400 are Martian meteorites.

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