Seismic images show dinosaur-killing meteor made big...(some evidence that marine organisms more...)
some evidence that marine organisms more resistant to a range of pH survived while those more sensitive did not.
Gulick says the mass extinction event was probably not caused by just one mechanism, but rather a combination of environmental changes acting on different time scales, in different locations. For example, many large land animals might have been baked to death within hours or days of the impact as ejected material fell from the sky, heating the atmosphere and setting off firestorms. More gradual changes in climate and acidity might have had a larger impact in the oceans.
Gulick and collaborators originally set out to learn more about the trajectory of the asteroid. They had hoped the craters structure in the subsurface would hold a tell-tale signature. Instead, the structure seemed to be most strongly shaped by the pre-impact conditions of the target site.
We discovered that the shallow structure of the crater was determined much more by what the impact site was like before impact than by the trajectory of the impactor, says Gulick.
If scientists can determine the trajectory, it will tell them where to look for the biggest environmental consequences of impact, because most of the hazardous, shock-heated and fast-moving material would have been thrown out of the crater downrange from the impact.
Researchers at Imperial College in London are already using computer models to search for possible signatures in impact craters that could indicate trajectory regardless of the initial surface conditions at the impact site.
As someone who simulates impact events using computers, this work provides valuable new constraints on both the pre-impact target structure and the final geometry of the cratered crust at Chicxulub, says Gareth Collins, a research fellow at Imperial College.
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| Contact: Marc Airhart mairhart@jsg.utexas.edu 512-471-2241 University of Texas at Austin Source:Eurekalert |
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