Once feared and vaunted as messages from heaven, meteorites today are coveted by collectors and by scientists seeking knowledge about the early days of the solar system. These extraterrestrial samples have become the target of modern-day treasure hunters, for whom meteorites can be chunks of cash that fall from the sky.

In SPACE.com's special meteorite feature, we look at the latest news from the world of the meteorite hunters and profiles many of the key players in the meteorite market. Find out what made them dedicate their lives to chasing down rocks from space.

Meteorite Hunter Michael Casper

Meteorites Turn Plumbing Contractor Into Aspiring Ph.D.

In the early 1990s Marvin Killgore hung up his contractor's license to start collecting meteorites full time. Soon he was making a living at it. Now Killgore's biggest thrill is contributing to the advancement of meteorite science. As a growing number of meteorites are turned up each year, the scientists who are tasked with analyzing and classifying them are struggling to keep up. Killgore, who has trained himself to do meteorite analysis, is chipping in. He is the only meteorite dealer who has been given clearance to classify meteorites himself -- a job usually reserved for Ph.D. planetary geochemists. Full Story.

Cosmic Art Critic Darryl Pitt

Darryl Pitt looks at meteorites with the eye of an art critic: It's all about the aesthetic qualities of a rock. Its shape, its balance, the form of surfaces of iron sculpted by the blaze of collisions with Earth's atmosphere at fantastic speeds. See what Pitt sells and how he has managed to cross-polinate the world's major institutional collections. Full Story.

Mike Farmer: Have Empty Suitcase, Will Travel

Twenty-seven-year-old Mike Farmer bought a meteorite 4 years ago and just wanted more. He left his university studies and began jetting across six continents on the trail of the hottest meteorites. He sells all his space rocks from his Internet site and has made a name for himself as the one to beat to the scene of new meteorite falls. Full Story.

Newest Mars Rock Sold for Big Bucks, Saved for Science

Million Dollar Mars Rock? No. But this new martian meteorite has sold for a good fraction of that, its buyers say. It looks like free-market meteorite traders, heady planetary scientists and museum curators have all benefited from the recent sale of a 1-pound chunk of Mars on Earth. Full Story.

Lifetime of Collecting Pays Off
for Lucky L.A. Rock Lover

Meet Robert Verish, the rockhound who went to clean out 20 years of collected rocks and found two black stones that turned out to be meteorites. Ripped from the surface of the Red Planet millions of years ago, they hit Verish like a winning lottery ticket, but he hasn't been spoiled by fortune. Full Story.

COMING UP:

Robert Haag has inspired almost every other major meteorite dealer in the business. He has traipsed across African deserts and found meteorites he saw in dreams a night before. He's been ripped off, set up, and thrown into an Argentinean jail. He has been called "the P.T. Barnum of meteorites," for his enthusiasm, and he has one of the best meteorite collections in the business. But is he ready to hang it all up and go fishing? Find out later this week.