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SUMMARY:Triggering of the largest Deccan eruptions by the Chicxulub impact
  OR What really killed the dinosaurs? - Prof Mark Richards\, University of
  California\, Berkeley
DTSTART:20161011T110000Z
DTEND:20161011T120000Z
UID:TALK66956@talks.cam.ac.uk
CONTACT:Sally Gibson
DESCRIPTION:The disappearance of the dinosaurs along with ~70% of species 
 in the fossil record about 66 million years ago (Cretaceous-Paleogene Boun
 dary\, or KPB) is widely attributed to the Chicxulub impact in Yucatán\, 
 Mexico. However\, at the same time\, one of the largest volcanic eruptions
  in recent Earth history\, the Deccan Traps\, was underway in India — a 
 coincidence\nthat has confounded geologists for three decades\, and is all
  the more remarkable since the four most recent mass extinctions all corre
 spond closely in time to continental flood basalt eruptions.\nMultiple lin
 es of evidence\, including new high precision radioisotopic dating work\, 
 suggest that Chicxulub\, the KPB\, and the onset of by far the most massiv
 e phase of Deccan volcanism all occurred within a brief time interval of <
 50\,000 years. A plausible explanation for this coincidence is that seismi
 c waves from the Mw~11 Chicxulub impact accelerated the Deccan Traps erupt
 ions by a factor of ~3 right at KPB time. Causal links aside\, it remains 
 difficult to determine whether the KPB mass extinction was caused primaril
 y by the impact itself or by the main-phase (impact-triggered?) Deccan eru
 ptions\, since both events would have affected the environment in similar 
 ways. Much more work is needed to better understand the physical mechanism
 s\, emplacement history\, and environmental effects of the Deccan Traps fl
 ood basalts\, and their possible relation to the end-Cretaceous mass extin
 ction.\n\nRichards\, M.A.\, Alvarez\, W.\, Self\, S.\, Karlstrom\, L.\, Re
 nne\, P\, Manga\, M.\, Sprain\,C.J.\, Smit\,J\, Vander-kluysen\, L. & Gibs
 on\, S.A. (2015). Triggering of the largest Deccan eruptions by the Chicxu
 lub impact. Geological Society of America Bulletin. doi: 10.1130/B31167.1 
 \n\nRenne\, P.R.\, Sprain\, C.J.\, Richards\, M.A.\, Self\, S.\, Vanderklu
 ysen\, L. & Pande\, K. (2015). State shift in Deccan volcanism at the Cret
 aceous-Paleogene boundary\, possibly induced by impact. Science 350\,76-78
  DOI:10.1126/science.aac7549 
LOCATION:Harker 1 seminar room\, Department of Earth Sciences
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