Recently, just as scientists were about to discover what lies beneath the seafloor, a mysterious crater surfaced. One generated most likely by the dinosaur-killing asteroid's relative.
The Mystery Crater from Mars
Earth's ocean floor is notoriously less researched than Mars' surface. With no prior studies and findings, a team of scientists recently found what seems to be an asteroid strike crater while mapping the seafloor and ancient sediments underneath it.
Surprisingly, the crater, called "Nadir" after the adjacent volcanic Nadir Seamount, has the same age as the Chicxulub impact. The Chicxulub crater is only a piece of asteroid remnants that wiped out the dinosaurs and other species at the end of the Cretaceous era, roughly 66 million years ago.
Also Read: Chicxulub Crater Study Suggests Asteroid Impacts Could Be Home To Early Life
Is it Related to The Dinosaur-Killing Asteroid?
The discovery, which was reported in Science Advances, raises the issue of whether the crater is connected to Chicxulub in any manner. If verified, it would be of enormous general scientific value because it would be one of only a few documented maritime asteroid collisions, providing unique novel clues into what transpires during such an asteroid strike.
Nadir crater was discovered using "seismic reflection" as part of a larger attempt to recreate South America's tectonic split from Africa during the Cretaceous epoch. Phys.org clarifies that seismic reflection is comparable to ultrasound data in how it sends pressure waves through the ocean and its floor and detects the energy thrown back. From there, geophysicists and geologists can use this information to rebuild the structure of rocks and sediments.
They also suggested that an explosive burst of gas from under the surface may be the reason. However, none of these scenarios are compatible with the surrounding geology or crater shape.
"We did consider other possible processes that could have formed such a crater, such as the collapse of a submarine volcano or a pillar (or diapir) of salt below the seabed," the researchers remarked.
The magnitude of the crater, the ratio of height to breadth, and the height of the crater rim are all compatible with an impact origin resembling the Chicxulub asteroid. Outside of the crater bottom, there lies a chaotic deposit similar to ejecta, material blasted from the crater shortly after an impact.
"Our stratigraphic framework suggests that the crater formed at or near the Cretaceous-Paleogene boundary (~66 million years ago), approximately the same age as the Chicxulub impact crater. We hypothesize that this formed as part of a closely timed impact cluster or by breakup of a common parent asteroid," the researchers concluded.
Regardless of the parallels between the dinosaur-killing asteroid and the crater in Nadir, the researchers estimate that a collision with a Nadir-sized asteroid will occur every 700,000 years or so based on preliminary data.
They will not be able to say clearly that the Nadir crater was caused by an asteroid impact until all samples have been collected from the crater and identify materials that can only be generated by tremendous shock pressures. To that aim, the researchers have filed a request to the International Ocean Discovery Program to explore the crater in order to learn more.
Related Article: Chicxulub Dinosaur-Killer Asteroid Impact To Be Probed For Answers To Extinction Mysteries
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Written by Thea Felicity
