(NLDO) - A super-object 200 times larger than the asteroid that wiped out the dinosaurs could be what helped us exist on Earth today.
As many previous studies have shown, life on Earth multiplied and evolved slowly in its early days, about 4 billion years ago. But 3.26 billion years ago, a major turning point may have occurred.
According to a research team led by geologist Nadja Drabon from Harvard University (USA), that turning point came from a giant attacker from space.
Rock layers in the Barberton Greenstone Belt preserve evidence of the collision that helped life on Earth explode - Photo: Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences
Of all the cosmic objects that have struck Earth, the Chicxulub asteroid, which caused the chain of events that led to the extinction of the dinosaurs, may be the most famous.
Chicxulub was 10-20 km in diameter, with the destructive power equivalent to 1 million atomic bombs, and today there are still traces of a 200 km diameter impact crater stretching from Mexico's Yucatan Peninsula into the sea.
According to Science Alert, new research has shown something even more terrifying: A "cosmic monster" 50-200 times larger than Chicxulub, which crashed into Earth 3.26 billion years ago.
The authors identified a formation called the Barberton Greenstone Belt in South Africa that contains evidence of the massive impact, an event known as S2.
They performed a detailed analysis of the minerals in the S2 rock layer and came up with a reconstruction of the sequence of events that followed.
Heat from the impact would boil the top layer of the ocean, while the impact itself is predicted to spew dust and debris into the atmosphere, creating a thick haze that blocks sunlight and hinders photosynthetic bacteria that live in shallow waters.
Additionally, a massive tsunami virtually scraped the ocean floor, bringing material normally hidden deep beneath the ocean floor to the surface.
While this may have been harmful to many evolving life forms that had been around for several hundred million years at this point, it was beneficial to some species.
For example, the "space monster" itself would release large amounts of phosphorus, while the water dredged from the seabed would be rich in iron.
Both of these elements would feed any bacteria capable of metabolizing them, causing a brief but significant spike in their numbers before the Earth stabilized again.
So, unintentionally, the collision provided a giant meal for countless life forms struggling with the harsh environment of the early Earth, giving them an easy source of life to reproduce and spread.
Multicellular organisms appeared much later, but the biological explosion more than 3 billion years ago served as a crucial push that accelerated the development of life, helping Earth's ecosystems become as diverse as we see them today at just over 4.54 billion years old.
Source: https://nld.com.vn/quai-vat-vu-tru-roi-xuong-trai-dat-lam-su-song-bung-no-196241024095731565.htm
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