Evidence of the meteorite that caused a glacial period

• The cause of detachment was a long time a mystery, until in 2007 that the researcher Richard Firestone found in Greenland a layer of burning in the ice
• 12 thousand 800 years ago there was a significant disappearance of the human being Previously, it was believed that it was due to an infection and that it had only been in the United States and Canada

The Swamps Paradise, the Wildlife ancestral, moisture and fruit trees and shade ended in glaciation. 18 million tons of meteorite fragments 12 thousand 800 years ago. Can you imagine a past of damp, abundant vegetation and unknown as food for flies, sloths, bison, mammoths, fleeing into sabrete swamps? The Michoacan lands that we are walking today are built on the ground that many ancestral animals have walked. In an instant, carbon dioxide (CO2) has filled the atmosphere and a fire has burned everything, the Earth has entered a new era of ice, attributed for many years to the release of a block of ice between Canada and the northeast. the United States. But the reason for this detachment has never been studied.

The research of the Doctor of Earth Sciences Isabel Israde Alcántara, attached to the Institute of Research in Earth Sciences and level II of the National System of Researchers (SNI), made it possible to specify that it was a meteorite that caused glaciation 12 thousand 800 years ago. The doctor is dedicated to searching in different parts of Mexico for evidence of a cosmic impact that has had many geological and environmental implications. This was achieved thanks to the study of the lakes of Michoacán, especially Lake Cuitzeo, which gave him the first clue. The cycle of glaciations "Every 100,000 years, for the last two million, there have been glaciations, it's a cycle of 100,000 cold years and 10,000 hot years. In spite of this rule, there was an interruption 18,000 years ago, when it corresponded to being in hot weather, there was a steep descent of temperatures that ended animal and plant life. "[19659004ThescientistsaysthatitwasbelievedthatitwasduetothedetachmentofablockoficefromNorthAmericaslowingdownthehotmarineconvectionsystemsandthatthebrakewasalsocontrollingtheair39evaporationofwaterstoppingthewarmconditionsofthecontinentsThecauseofthisdetachmentwasamysteryforalongtimeuntilin2007theresearcherRichardFirestonefoundinGreenlandalayerofcombustioninice"Nowthatmanylayersoficehavebeenshatteredbyclimatechangehavebeenexposedoldlayersoficethisallowedthedoctortoseealayerofcarbonthatcoulddatethatbelongedto12thousand800yearsWiththesedataFirestonepostulatedthetheoryofacosmicimpactthatwouldcatalyzethedetachmentoftheiceblockgeneratingtheconditionsofanuclearwinterbyimpactshockwaveradiationandwindsthedoctorsaysThiscausedthecoaltoburntheforestsandtobringthismaterialupintotheatmospherebysettlinginthelayersoficeThat'swhytheresearchermightfinditintheselayersexposedbyglobalwarming

Relation of the meteorite to the Michoacan lakes

Isabel Israde has a specialty in stratigraphy, which is the study of the Earth's layers, and explains that diatoms can say a lot about the past, because Although their lives last only 30 days, they have a silica skeleton that protects the information and allows you to study the past from its structure. Since the end of his thesis he studied the lakes of Michoacán, in order to understand if the episodes of the lakes were cyclical or random, "The lakes are like bathtubs, everything you throw falls in the center, so we could study to understand the impact of man and detail the volcanic activity. "

In their study, they introduced a kind of metal straws that collect information from the layers of the Earth that are under the lakes, can see the passage of years depending on the depth. In 1998, they took a very long core from the center of Lake Cuitzeo, which took three years to analyze in each of its layers. They found in each study that there was always a layer where the lake level increased considerably; however, they claimed that this was due to an error in the analysis. The doctor knew that it was not like that, but the sample kept working, "The algae have preferences, tolerances and requirements from where they are located. 39 They found in this layer that they studied had preference of deep water squares, however, this did not coincide with Lake Cuitzeo, which has an average depth of three meters. " researcher did not understand why it was deep, because moreover this peculiarity lasted a short time because it was only in 10 centimeters of sediments, located at 2.85 meters of the lacustrine substrate, on the 27 meters that they analyzed. In this layer they found a level of coal and made the dates.

Space Bubbles under the Microscope

Under the light microscope, Isabel Israde saw that there were always spherules that were still found when observing diatoms. They tried to combine them with different substances to dispel them, "but since they are made of iron, they have become brighter and more beautiful." At first I thought it was water bubbles; however, "they are spherules, which are round bodies that have a cauliflower-like ornamentation or filigree structures, which are given by a very rapid cooling". The doctor points out that now they know that this has happened because of the shock with the atmosphere, "the spherules collided until they fuse, but not completely," says that they have wrinkles produced by melting metal and others in the form of drop with the same ornamentation. These spherules gave him the very proof of the direction of the cosmic wind at the moment of collision with the atmosphere.

They found nanodiamonds

The bias that was in the depths made them study the nucleus every three centimeters, this work took a lot of time because each sample takes several weeks, says the doctor. When they finished, they collected spherule data, pollen analysis, diatoms, changes in strata and sent them to analyze by a technique that would detect nanodiamonds, "The diamonds detected in this layer strata indicate that there were emitted in a volcanic explosion, which are generated with the pressure and temperature at which the coal is exposed. " They already had all the proxies, so the doctor could start writing the conclusions of his research.

It was a meteorite

At the same time, 12,800 years ago, there was a significant disappearance of the human being, it was previously believed that it was due to a infection and that it was only in the United States and Canada They began to detect these coincidences, carbon found in the ice caps, the disappearance of the human being, the depth inconsistencies and the nanodiamonds in the Lake Cuitzeo. A group of researchers from around the world gathered to find evidence in different countries.

Isabel Israde concluded that all these phenomena may have been caused by a cosmic impact in many parts of the Earth. "It was not just a meteor, it was a lot of pieces of one that fragmented out of the planet." We found parts in Belgium, Syria, Venezuela, Spain, Italy, Russia, among others. "They calculated that about 18 million tons of meteorites fell in the world," This meteor comes from the cloud of Oort, which is beyond Neptune – it's a galactic garbage dump with no orbit where everything that happened in the Big Bang and that did not become a planet eventually happened, while They wander aimlessly, they can generate collapses ".

He points out that what the geologists could see were those on the surface; However, she always thought that lakes should be observed. Was he alone in Cuitzeo? What will happen if larger lakes could have functioned as time capsules, thus allowing the evidence to be stored in the sediments until we discover them? Wonders the researcher.

That is why he makes trips to different sedimentary environments, deserts, lakes, ciénegas, jungles. He submitted the project to the Conacyt Basic Science Fund and obtained it for three consecutive years. She knew that her discovery was important. During this trip, they have already found other evidence such as Cuitzeo, Chapala, Acambay, Valle de Santiago, Tocuila and Chalco. In Tocuila, nine mammoths were found, on which were the layers that provided data on the meteorite. For the researcher, these results are important for a very simple reason: "They show the fragility of the human being. When an event like this occurs, destroy everything. We do not realize that we are only one point in space. "

With the information of Paloma Carreño Acuña and Agencia Informativa Conacyt