[Purdue University] Sixty-six million years ago, an asteroid about the size of Mount Everest smacked into Earth near where the Yucatan Peninsula is today. That impact created the Chicxulub crater […]
Extinction events
Posted inAtmospheres, Climate, Weather
Triassic Inferno: Fires Raged Across Europe For thousands Of Years During Past Global Warming
[Utrecht University] The end-Triassic mass extinction, 201 million years ago, is linked to volcanism that resulted from the break-up of Pangea and which pumped out vast amounts of CO2 into […]
Posted inImpact events
Researchers Identify Class Of Oddball Meteorite That Killed Earth’s Dinosaurs
[University of British Columbia] A rare CO chondrite meteorite was the probable impactor that struck Earth 66 million years ago, wiping out 75 per cent of Earth’s species, including non-avian […]
Posted inExtinction events
Researchers Confirm The Cause Of Earth’s Biggest Mass Extinction
[Stanford University] A new Stanford-led study offers the clearest picture yet of how some ocean life survived our planet’s biggest mass extinction while most animals did not.
Posted inImpact events
Asteroid Assault Made Ancient Earth Too Hot And Chaotic For Continents To Form
[Curtin University] New research led by Curtin University and QUT (Queensland University of Technology) has revealed repeated asteroid impacts may have been the dominant force shaping the early Earth, delivering […]
Posted inAstrogeology, Biosignatures & Paleobiology, Caves, Craters, Mountains, Subsurface, Lava Tubes, Extinction events, Fossils & Paleontology, Habitable Zones, Imaging & Spectroscopy, Impact events, Mapping, Geodesy, Cartography, Bathymetry, Press Release
Meteorite Which Wiped Out The Dinosaurs Also Created A Record-breaking Hydrothermal System
The meteorite which caused the extinction of the dinosaurs also created an underground environment suited to supporting new life, and new research suggests it lasted for millions of years longer […]
Posted inAtmospheres, Climate, Weather, Biosignatures & Paleobiology, Comets and Asteroids, Extinction events, Habitable Zones, Impact events, Meteorites & Asteroids, Status Report
An 800-Million-Year-Old Impact Shower on the Terrestrial Planets from the Breakup of the Eulalia Parent Body
Multiple studies have proposed a substantial surge in large lunar impacts approximately 800 million years ago (Ma).
Posted inBiogeochemical Cycles & Geobiology, Biosignatures & Paleobiology, Extinction events, Fossils & Paleontology, Gaia - Planetary Perspectives, Impact events, Nomenclature, Systematics, Natural History, Origin & Evolution of Life, Press Release, Water/Hycean Worlds & Oceanography
Pioneering Research Sheds New Light On What Shaped Extinction Pattern Of Prehistoric Marine Life – And Size Clearly Mattered
Scientists have shown conclusively for the first time that tiny marine organisms in polar oceans survived the mass extinction event that wiped out prehistoric dinosaurs because they needed less energy […]
Posted inAtmospheres, Climate, Weather, Biogeochemical Cycles & Geobiology, Extinction events, Gaia - Planetary Perspectives, Habitable Zones, Icy Worlds, Mars, Status Report, Terraforming & Geoengineering, Water/Hycean Worlds & Oceanography
Mars, A Post-Habitable Planet?
Mars provides a critical analog to once habitable exoplanets that have since lost their surface liquid water.
Posted inAway Teams & Field Reports, Biogeochemical Cycles & Geobiology, Biosignatures & Paleobiology, Extinction events, Fossils & Paleontology, Habitable Zones, Mapping, Geodesy, Cartography, Bathymetry, Origin & Evolution of Life, Press Release, Sample Return
Early Complex Earth Life Clung To Oxygenated Seafloors For Hundreds Of Millions Of Years
From the highest mountains to the deepest ocean, the driest desert to the lushest jungle, Earth displays a dazzling array of lifeforms. And eukaryotes account for many of these lifeforms, […]