Evidence of the asteroid that killed the dinosaurs found on the moon

An article published this Wednesday (28) in the magazine Science advances describes research conducted by scientists at Curtin University’s Space Science and Technology Center (SSTC) in Australia that brings startling revelations about the asteroid that killed the dinosaurs. According to the study, there is evidence of impacts on the Moon that correspond to the same event here on Earth.

The largest asteroid attacks in our planet’s prehistory were accompanied by a series of small impacts here and on the Moon, the surface of which contains about 9,000 craters formed by these collisions.

This research can help astronomers better understand the dynamics of the inner Solar System (the stretch of our neighborhood that extends to Mars) and help calculate the likelihood of our planet being hit by potentially devastating massive space rocks in the future.

Scientists arrived at these results by analyzing tektites, microscopic glass beads inside lunar soil samples, brought to Earth by China’s Chang’e-5 mission in 2020. These glass beads are created by heat and heat. intense pressure generated by asteroid attacks.

From this analysis, researchers can construct a timeline of the collisions on the Moon by evaluating the age of these pearls. Therefore, the SSTC team found that both the timing and frequency of asteroid impacts on the Moon coincide with the attacks of space rocks on Earth, meaning that the constructed timeline could also provide information on the evolution of our own. planet.

“We combined a wide range of microscopic analytical techniques, numerical models and geological investigations to determine how and when these microscopic glass beads of the moon formed,” study lead author Alexander Nemchin, professor at the study, said in a statement. the SSTC.

According to Nemchin, the age of some of the lunar glass beads indicates that they were created about 66 million years ago, around the time the Chicxulub asteroid hit Earth in what is now the Gulf of Mexico, near the Yucatan Peninsula. , in Mexico, cleaning up 75% of the life on our planet, including dinosaurs.

With a width of about 10 km, this space rock hit the Earth at about 70,000 km / h, leaving an impact crater about 180 km wide and 19 km deep.

In addition to the shock waves generated by the initial shock, the asteroid would have caused a number of significant impact effects, including the release of thick clouds of dust that blocked sunlight.

According to the website space.com, the team now intends to compare data collected from samples from the Chang’e-5 mission with other lunar soil samples and with the age of craters on the lunar surface. Such an analysis could reveal other impact events on the Moon and, in turn, help uncover signs of asteroid impacts here on Earth that may have influenced the evolution of life.

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Source: Olhar Digital