“I think dinosaurs could still be alive today,” if the asteroid had landed elsewhere, Kunio Kaiho, a paleontologist from Tohoku University in Japan and lead author on the study, said in an email. When the asteroid, which had a diameter about half the length of Manhattan, struck the coast of Mexico, it found a rich source of sulfur and hydrocarbons, or organic deposits like fossil fuels, according to the researchers. PhotoThe Chicxulub impact spewed an extraordinary amount of black carbon, or soot, from the rocks, the researchers said. Locations with less hydrocarbons would have jetted less soot into the sky upon impact and created a smaller cooling effect around the globe. So Dr. Kaiho set out to determine the mass extinction hot spots in the Mesozoic real estate market.

Source: New York Times November 09, 2017 17:37 UTC