EXPERIMENTAL SIMULATIONS OF CHONDRULE FORMATION BY RADIATIVE HEATING OF HOT PLANETESIMALSCHONDRULES ARE MM-SIZED SPHERES OF IGNEOUS ROCK THAT ARE ABUNDANT IN PRIMITIVE METEORITES. THEY HAVE BEEN THE SUBJECT OF INNUMERABLE STUDIES OVER THE DECADES BECAUSE OF THEIR PROMISE TO REVEAL MUCH ABOUT CONDITIONS IN THE EARLY SOLAR SYSTEM THAT WILL GUIDE PLANET FORMATION THEORIES. INSTEAD OF GUIDING THEORY HOWEVER THEY HAVE TENDED TO PLAGUE IT BECAUSE THE CIRCUMSTANCES OF THEIR FORMATION IN PARTICULAR THE SOURCE OF THE REQUIRED HEAT REMAINS UNKNOWN. BEFORE WE CAN CLAIM TO UNDERSTAND THE FORMATION OF PLANETS INCLUDING OUR OWN WE MUST ACCOUNT FOR THE EXISTENCE AND PROPERTIES OF CHONDRULES. UNTIL THEIR MESSAGE IS FULLY DECODED IT CANNOT BE INTEGRATED INTO A COHERENT MODEL OF HOW PLANETS EMERGED FROM THE PROTOPLANETARY DISK. OBJECTIVES: WE PROPOSE TO ADDRESS THE ISSUE OF CHONDRULE FORMATION BY CRITICALLY TESTING A NEW HYPOTHESIS (THAT WE HAVE RECENTLY PUBLISHED IN THE JOURNAL ICARUS) THAT CAN EXPLAIN ALL THEIR KNOWN FEATURES. THE IDEA IS TO HEAT THE CHONDRULES IN A SETTLED DUST-RICH SUB-LAYER OF THE PROTOSOLAR NEBULA BY RADIATION FROM EMBEDDED HOT PLANETESIMALS. THE PRIMARY HEAT SOURCE IS 26-AL WHICH MUST BE INCUBATED FOR TIMES OF ABOUT 1 MYR IN MODERATE-SIZED PLANETESIMALS BEFORE IT IS RELEASED AS RADIANT ENERGY FROM INCANDESCENT LAVA AT THEIR SURFACES. WE HAVE SHOWN THAT A MODEL LIKE THIS NATURALLY ACCOUNTS FOR THE OBSERVED TEMPERATURE RANGE AND COOLING CURVES OF THE CHONDRULES AND FOR THE TIME DELAY FROM CAI FORMATION AND THE TIME FRAME OF THE EVENTS. IMPORTANTLY IT MAKES STRONG TESTABLE PREDICTIONS ABOUT THE HEATING AND COOLING RATES OF CHONDRULES AND PROVIDES A FRAMEWORK FOR UNDERSTANDING OTHER ASPECTS OF THEIR NATURE SUCH AS COMPLEMENTARITY MULTIPLE HEATING EVENTS IGNEOUS RIMS AND THEIR FORMATION IN RELATIVELY HIGH DENSITY BUT H-POOR ENVIRONMENTS. WE WILL HIRE A POSTDOCTORAL RESEARCHER TO CONDUCT EXPERIMENTS TO SEE IF WE CAN REPRODUCE CHONDRULE TEXTURES FROM REASONABLE STARTING MATERIALS UNDER THE THERMAL CONDITIONS OF OUR MODEL. WE WILL CONDUCT 1 ATM EXPERIMENTS ON CHONDRULE ANALOG COMPOSITIONS TO SIMULATE THE TEMPERATURE CURVES THAT OUR MODEL PREDICTS. WE WILL MAKE CHONDRULE ANALOG COMPOSITIONS FROM CHARACTERIZED KNOWN MINERALS FOLLOWING ESTABLISHED METHODOLOGY. THE EXPERIMENTS WILL BE CONDUCTED IN A DELTECH 1 ATM VERTICAL TUBE FURNACE CAPABLE OF 1725 C PEAK TEMPERATURE EQUIPPED WITH A EUROTHERM 9404 TEMPERATURE CONTROLLER THAT ALLOWS 16 PROGRAMMABLE HEATING AND COOLING SEGMENTS THAT CAN GO AS LOW AS 0.1 C/MIN. THIS WILL ALLOW US TO ACCESS MUCH OF RELEVANT TEMPERATURE AND TIME SPACE TO SIMULATE BOTH FEO-RICH AND FEO-POOR CHONDRULES. CHONDRULE ANALOG MATERIALS WILL BE SIZE-SORTED WEIGHED PRECISELY AND LOADED INTO HIGH-PURITY IRON CAPSULES FOR FEO-POOR CHONDRULE EXPERIMENTS. WE WILL BE TRYING TO REPRODUCE THE DOMINANT CHONDRULE TYPES PORPHYRITIC CHONDRULES. WE WILL ALSO BE ATTEMPTING TO DETERMINE LOSS OR GAIN OF SODIUM DURING THE HEATING AND COOLING STEPS OF THE EXPERIMENTS (A SECONDARY CONSIDERATION TO THE TEXTURES). RELEVANCE TO NASA AND NASA-ROSES2016-EMERGING WORLDS: THE RESEARCH PROPOSED HERE IS HIGHLY RELEVANT TO NASA S STRATEGIC GOALS. WE ARE ATTEMPTING TO SHED LIGHT ON AND PERHAPS SOLVE ONE OF THE UNEXPLAINED MYSTERIES OF COSMOCHEMISTRY NAMELY HOW DID THE CHONDRULES FORM? THE SYMMETRICAL HIGHLY CONSTRAINED HEATING AND COOLING CURVES THAT OUR MODEL PREDICTS FOR CHONDRULE FORMATION CAN READILY BE TESTED IN THE LABORATORY. THE PROPOSED RESEARCH IS TO UNDERSTAND CHEMICAL PROCESSING OF GAS DUST AND ICE AS WELL AS THE CHEMICAL AND PHYSICAL PROPERTIES OF ANCIENT MATERIALS AND IS RELEVANT TO PROTOPLANETARY DISK FORMATION AND EVOLUTION.