People often opt for extravagant and lavish art pieces to decorate their homes as a display of wealth, but there are perhaps few more impressive items you could have in your home than a piece of space rock from hundreds of millions of miles away.
While the world's biggest space agencies across public and private sectors are still working away at getting humans to Mars, there have thankfully been a number of unmanned missions that allow scientists to study the red planet's surface remotely.
These often involve experiments on Mars itself where a remote-controlled craft provides a window to researchers back on Earth, and extraction missions that bring back pieces for further study.
With clear obstacles still in the way for human exploration and colonization of Mars, and a shift of priorities for NASA thanks to a recent budget change from President Trump, having a piece of Mars yourself could be more valuable than ever before.
How much does the Mars fragment cost?
As reported by the Daily Mail, the 24.67 kilogram piece of Mars named NWA 16788 is currently up for auction on Sotheby's with an estimated final price between $2,000,000 and $4,000,000.
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The live auction begins on Wednesday, July 16, and has an opening minimum bid of $1,600,000, making it an incredibly expensive investment but one that would likely be worth it for someone wanting to stand out from the crowd.
It is just one of 400 officially recognized Martian meteorites, and stands as the biggest among an approximate combined weight of 374 kilograms, representing around 6.5% of all material currently recognized and collected from Mars.
Why is this Mars fragment up for sale?
You might be wondering why this piece of Mars is available to purchase considering most pieces would find themselves in a NASA laboratory for scientific study, but it's all down to the circumstances which led this rock fragment to find Earth.
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The auction listing reveals that this particular piece was ejected from the surface of Mars by an asteroid strike, beyond journeying roughly 140,000,000 miles through space and crash landing in the Sahara desert.
It was then discovered in November 2023 by a meteorite hunter in the Agadez Region of Niger, and was validated and published in the 113th edition of the Meteoritical Bulletin.
Before becoming available for auction, NWA 16788 was exhibited to he public at the Italian Space Agency in Rome, and also in a private gallery in Arezzo, Tuscany, so you can imagine that this has caused many to become interested in bringing it to their own home.
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It is a particularly rare fragment from Mars too alongside its size and weight, as it has been categorized as an olivine-microgabbroic shergottite, which is formed by the slow cooling of magma and spotted by its course-grained texture.
"Only 5.4% of Martian meteorites are currently classified as either gabbroic or microgabbroic, making this a rare type of rock within the already extremely rare category of Martian meteorites," explains the auction's catalogue note.