![]() ![]() However, I found the various other interpretations of how this depression could have formed unconvincing from a geological perspective." That is why he and his wife collected rock samples for analysis in the labs at Goethe University Frankfurt - and indeed found the first signs of an impact crater. Although this hypothesis was proposed by several geologists in the 1950s, it was dismissed by acclaimed colleagues a few years later.įrank Brenker explains: "Craters can form in many ways, and meteorite craters are indeed very rare. One of its vineyards lies in a round depression about 220 metres in diameter and 30 metres deep, and the proprietors use the scientific hypothesis that it is the impact crater of a meteorite - seemingly long disproved - as a marketing gag for their wine. While on holiday, the "Domaine du Météore" winery caught his attention. Geologist and cosmochemist Professor Frank Brenker from Goethe University Frankfurt is convinced: the new meteorite crater will now extend the list. Thanks to millions of years of erosion, however, for laypersons the three impact craters are hardly recognisable as such. In the whole of Western Europe, only three were previously known: Rochechouart in Aquitaine, France, the Nördlinger Ries between the Swabian Alb and the Franconian Jura, and the Steinheim Basin near Heidenheim in Baden-Württemberg (both in Germany). The "Earth Impact Database" lists just 190 such craters worldwide. ![]() This is due to erosion and shifting processes in Earth's crust, known as plate tectonics. Meteorite craters which are still visible today are rare because most traces of the celestial bodies have long since disappeared again. The extinction of the dinosaurs might also have been triggered by the impact of a very large meteorite. It is assumed, for example, that meteorites brought with them a large part of its water. They then compared this estimate with images from the MRO and were able to confirm crater impact sites – a first for planetary seismology.Countless meteorites have struck Earth in the past and shaped the history of our planet. This results in waves from an impact arriving at a detector at different times and from different directions.Ī collaboration of researchers from Curtin University in Australia and the Université de Toulouse in France have analysed InSight lander seismometer data from 4 meteorite impacts and used the different arrival times of the wave fronts from each impact to estimate the location of the impact. ![]() When the energy waves encounter a new material – a new composition, pressure or temperature – some energy bounces off the interface, while some energy travels through into the new material, but with a different speed and at a different angle. When energy travels through solids and gasses (such as the interior of planets or through air), it does so in the form of waves. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/University of Arizona Now, with the help of the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO), which has been circling around Mars for the past 16 and a half years, researchers have been able to use data on waves travelling through the air and interior of the planet to estimate and confirm the location of an impact site of four incoming meteorites.Īn impact crater captured from HiRISE instrument aboard the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter in 2013. Short for ‘Interior Exploration using Seismic Investigations, Geodesy and Heat Transport’, InSight has been using sensitive instruments to detect seismic waves, heat flow and accurate measurements of the shape and size of the planet – or, as NASA describes it, “the planet’s pulse, circulation and reflexes.” NASA’s InSight Mars Lander has been studying the red planet’s interior, from its surface, since November 26, 2018. Scientists have for the first time been able to find impact sites of incoming Martian meteorites using their sound and seismic waves, which might lead to greater understanding of the makeup of the planet they are headed for. ![]()
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