A killer asteroid that sent dinosaurs into extinction 66 million years ago released as much energy as 100 million nuclear bombs. It scarred the Earth’s crust 200 km wide and 20 km deep – the ‘Crater of Doom’. The aftermath was much worse with tsunamis, monstrous earthquakes and firestorms. If ancient humans had roamed the Earth with the dinosaurs, they wouldn’t have survived.
Scientists are still intrigued by this killer asteroid, so they are researching for more details. Walter Alvarez, a physicist, and his fellow researchers discovered a layer of debris laid down in 66-million-year-old rocks worldwide. The stones featured the element iridium which is rare on Earth but abundant in asteroids and comets. In no time, the researchers linked this to the asteroid that killed the dinosaurs.
A study published recently in Science gives insights into this killer asteroid. It highlights the mega space rock as carbonaceous – the asteroid was rich in organic compounds and carbon. The asteroid is now described as an ancient space rock that also featured water and clay.
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Ancient Asteroid Beyond Our Solar System
Scientists believe such asteroids are very rare. And it may have formed in the outer solar system, beyond Jupiter. The mega asteroid may have hitched a ride in the inner solar system’s asteroid belt after being hurled by giant planets orbital interactions over 4.5 billion years ago. Scientists say this may have occurred just a few million years after the sun got its shine.
Mario Fischer-Godde, a geochemist at Germany’s University of Cologne, says the impact changed the picture of Earth and caused the emergence of mammalian life. This comes after a sequence of events that began in the very initial days of the solar system more than four billion years later. Another expert said stellar nucleosynthetic variations in isotopes help trace how various parts of the solar system evolved.
