Lead
Dinosaurs have long since disappeared from the earth, but scientists have been able to determine their existence in the past through the study of fossils.
Not only that, but there is also evidence of the existence of the fifth mass extinction, which is the cause of an asteroid hitting the Earth in the search of scientists.
So what kind of extinction power did this asteroid trigger?
1. The catastrophe is approaching.
This asteroid impact occurred about 65 million years ago, when a large family of dinosaurs lived on Earth, and they had no natural predators and were very powerful life forms.
But an asteroid with a diameter of 10 kilometers suddenly fell about 150 kilometers from the Gulf of Mexico in South America, forming a crater on Earth with a diameter of about 200 kilometers.
How devastating would this impact be as powerful as the energy produced by a billion atomic bombs at the same time?
The research team found that when a huge asteroid fell on the earth, it would affect the surrounding rocks and land, forming a powerful earthquake, and even causing the entire earth to tremble.
The tremendous impact energy can also produce volcanic eruptions, collapse of buildings, and the formation of huge earthquakes and tsunamis, which will certainly affect all living things on Earth.
The energy brought by this asteroid impact is equivalent to the power of 200 billion atomic bombs exploding at the same time, so this impact is a rather slow extermination force.
At the same time as the asteroid fell, a huge crater was quickly formed, but this crater was not discovered until 1960, when American scientists conducted an exploration of the Earth.
During this exploration, it was discovered that some of the Earth's formations had changed dramatically, and a huge meteorite was found in the Gulf of Mexico, which attracted them at once.
But I didn't expect that this meteorite is the remnant of the asteroid hitting the earth 65 million years ago, and it is just a change that occurs on the earth, and when a series of changes occur on the earth, a crater is formed.
2. The catastrophe caused by asteroids.
When an asteroid hits the Earth, the energy generated is absorbed by the Earth, but if the energy is too large, it will affect the Earth's core, cause volcanic eruptions, and cause powerful earthquakes, which will cause the collapse of the surrounding rocky land.
And that's not all, as the Earth's energy is absorbed to a certain extent, the Earth will be swept up by the impacting asteroids, forming a global tsunami.
The force of this tsunami is enough to involve life in the offshore area, causing the death of a large number of marine animals, and even the plants growing on the beach will be swept away by this tsunami, so the huge life force will be affected.
The impact also triggered volcanic eruptions on a global scale, with huge plumes of smoke and lava being ejected into the air and on the ground, enveloping the entire planet in soot.
The sunlight is almost blocked, causing the photosynthesis of plants on the earth to be affected, and life on land and in the sea will be like the dinosaurs, unable to find enough food, constituting a rupture of the food chain.
65 million years ago, the entire earth was shrouded in huge soot, forming a giant parasol, which blocked the sun's rays, causing the earth to enter a cold ice age.
It was the lack of food caused by the severe cold of the glacier and the lack of sunlight to reach the plants for photosynthesis that led to the extinction of a large number of organisms 65 million years ago.
In this extinction event, 75% of all biological species were extinct, not only the extinction of dinosaurs, but also the extinction of life species living in the ocean, but there were also some creatures who survived.
For example, the origin of human beings is in this mass extinction, if there is no extinction event this time, it is very likely that human beings will not appear, and the creatures of the dinosaur family are ruled on the earth.
3. The extinction of the dinosaurs was not entirely due to impact.
Although the dinosaur family was wiped out by an asteroid impact 65 million years ago, some scientific research groups have put forward different views on this.
In the research survey, it was found that the dinosaur family did not cause their extinction because of the asteroid impact on the earth, but that the number of dinosaurs had already begun to decline 24 million years before the impact.
Scientists have found that the climate change on the earth during this period was relatively chaotic, and the food source of the dinosaur family gradually decreased, so in this 24 million years, many dinosaur life has died out one after another, until the asteroid hit the earth, resulting in the complete extinction of the dinosaur family.
In this extinction event, 75% of the biological species were extinct one after another, but there were also some organisms that burst out with life force in this extinction event.
In the aftermath of the extinction event, life on land evolved into feathered dinosaurs, which evolved from the dinosaur family and gradually developed in the direction of miniaturization, eventually forming today's birds.
There are also some carnivorous dinosaurs that evolved and gradually adapted to the climate and environment of the land, and after the extinction of the dinosaur family, they became the rulers of land life, and the emergence of Homo sapiens, which can be said to have evolved from the dinosaur family.
So after the extinction event, the life force of the dinosaur family has not completely dissipated, and scientists have found some strange places after studying some plant fossils, which is the vitality left by the dinosaur family.
epilogue
65 million years ago, the mass extinction event caused by the impact of an asteroid on the earth pushed all the life species on the earth to the brink of extinction, and some surviving life species gradually evolved into the creatures we know today.
In the study of the dinosaur family, scientists have found that dinosaurs evolved into birds, but some of them had feathers and some of them did not have feathers, which is also evidence of the gradual extinction of the dinosaur family.
After the extinction of the dinosaurs, the birds formed gradually adapted to their current size and living habits, so some of the current birds still retain the shadow of the dinosaur family, including the chickens we know now.
The development of life on earth is a long evolutionary process, and during this period, it is still necessary for human beings to protect the ecological balance of the earth and avoid repeating the tragedy of the dinosaur family.