Brownleeite is a silicide

Silicide

A silicide is a compound that has silicon with more electropositive elements.Silicon is more electropositive than carbon. Silicides are structurally closer to borides than to carbides....

 mineral with chemical formula

Chemical formula

A chemical formula or molecular formula is a way of expressing information about the atoms that constitute a particular chemical compound....

 MnSi. It was discovered by researchers of the Johnson Space Center

Lyndon B. Johnson Space Center

The Lyndon B. Johnson Space Center is the National Aeronautics and Space Administration's center for human spaceflight training, research and flight control. The center consists of a complex of 100 buildings constructed on 1,620 acres in Houston, Texas, USA...

 in Houston while analyzing the Pi Puppid

Pi Puppids

The Pi Puppids are a meteor shower associated with the comet 26P/Grigg-Skjellerup.The meteor stream was viewable around April 23 but only in years around the parent comet's perihelion date, the last being in 2003...

 particle shower of the comet 26P/Grigg-Skjellerup

26P/Grigg-Skjellerup

Comet Grigg–Skjellerup is a periodic comet.Discovered in 1902 by John Grigg of New Zealand, and rediscovered in its next appearance in 1922 by John Francis Skjellerup, an Australian then living and working for about two decades in South Africa where he was a founder member of the Astronomical...

.

Overview

The particles where collected from the stratosphere

Stratosphere

The stratosphere is the second major layer of Earth's atmosphere, just above the troposphere, and below the mesosphere. It is stratified in temperature, with warmer layers higher up and cooler layers farther down. This is in contrast to the troposphere near the Earth's surface, which is cooler...

 over south-western USA in April 2003 using an ER-2 high-altitude research aircraft of the NASA

NASA

The National Aeronautics and Space Administration is the agency of the United States government that is responsible for the nation's civilian space program and for aeronautics and aerospace research...

. The team of researchers from USA, Germany and Japan was led by NASA scientist Keiko Nakamura-Messenger.

To determine the mineral's origin and examine other dust materials, a new transmission electron microscope was installed in 2005 at Johnson Space Center.

The mineral name was approved by the International Mineralogical Association

International Mineralogical Association

The International Mineralogical Association is an international group of 38 national societies. The goal is to promote the science of mineralogy and to standardize the nomenclature of the 4000 plus known mineral species...

 (IMA Nummer 2008-011). The NASA scientists named the mineral after Donald E. Brownlee

Donald E. Brownlee

Don Brownlee is a professor of astronomy at the University of Washington and the principal investigator for NASA's STARDUST mission. His primary research interests include astrobiology, comets, cosmic dust, and porsche evangelism....

, professor of astronomy at the University of Washington

University of Washington

University of Washington is a public research university, founded in 1861 in Seattle, Washington, United States. The UW is the largest university in the Northwest and the oldest public university on the West Coast. The university has three campuses, with its largest campus in the University...

, Seattle.