CAPE CANAVERAL, Florida |
(Reuters) - Dinosaurs died off about 33,000 years after an asteroid hit
the Earth, much sooner than scientists had believed, and the asteroid
may not have been the sole cause of extinction, according to a study
released Thursday.Earth's climate may have been at a tipping point when a massive asteroid smashed into what is now Mexico's Yucatan Peninsula and triggered cooling temperatures that wiped out the dinosaurs, researchers said.
The time between the asteroid's arrival, marked by a 110-mile-(180-km-)wide crater near Chicxulub, Mexico, and the dinosaurs' demise was believed to be as long as 300,000 years.
The study, based on high-precision radiometric dating techniques, said the events occurred within 33,000 years of each other.
Other scientists had questioned whether dinosaurs died before the asteroid impact.
More - Link >>> http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/02/08/us-space-asteroid-dinosaurs-idUSBRE91618A20130208
Source: Reuters News Wire Service.
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