66 million years after the impact that wiped out the dinosaurs, researchers claim to have identified the origin of the asteroid responsible for one of the most dramatic events in Earth’s history. The celestial body would have formed in the cold regions of the Solar System, beyond the orbit of Jupiter.
The asteroid, estimated to be 10-15 kilometers in diameter, hit the present-day Yucatán Peninsula in Mexico at a speed of about 20 kilometers per second, forming the Chicxulub crater, which has a diameter of about 180 kilometers.
The impact vaporized the rocks in the collision zone and launched huge amounts of dust, ash and other particles into the atmosphere. They blocked the Sun’s light for months or even years, causing the climate to cool and food chains based on photosynthesis to collapse. About 75 percent of Earth’s species have gone extinct, including all non-avian dinosaurs, Space Daily reports.
How researchers found out where the asteroid came from
Until now, the scientific community knew that the extinction of the dinosaurs was caused by an asteroid impact, but its origin remained unknown.
A team led by geochemist Mario Fischer-Gödde, from the University of Cologne, analyzed ruthenium isotopes in the geological layer formed by the impact, using samples collected from Denmark, Italy and Spain.
According to a study published in 2024 in the journal Science, the results showed that “footprint” The asteroid’s chemistry corresponds to carbonaceous chondrites, a primitive type of asteroid formed in the outer reaches of the Solar System, beyond Jupiter.
At the same time, the analysis excludes the hypothesis that the object was a comet or an asteroid formed in the inner part of the Solar System.
Is there a risk of a similar impact?
The researchers point out that such collisions are extremely rare, occurring, on average, at intervals of tens of millions of years.
Most of the large near-Earth asteroids have already been identified and monitored, and none of the known ones are on a collision course with the planet.
Scientists continue to track smaller, harder-to-detect cosmic objects and study the effects of the Chicxulub impact in detail to better understand the mechanisms that led to the end-Cretaceous mass extinction.
The discovery provides some of the strongest evidence yet that the asteroid that changed the course of life on Earth and wiped out the dinosaurs began its journey in the far reaches of the Solar System, beyond the orbit of Jupiter.
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