Giant Crater Found [in Antarctica]: Tied to Worst Mass Extinction Ever [Permo-Triassic]

An apparent crater as big as Ohio has been found in Antarctica. Scientists think it was carved by a space rock that caused the greatest mass extinction on Earth, 250 million years ago.

The crater, buried beneath a half-mile of ice and discovered by some serious airborne and satellite sleuthing, is more than twice as big as the one involved in the demise of the dinosaurs.

The crater's location, in the Wilkes Land region of East Antarctica, south of Australia, suggests it might have instigated the breakup of the so-called Gondwana supercontinent, which pushed Australia northward, the researchers said.

"This Wilkes Land impact is much bigger than the impact that killed the dinosaurs, and probably would have caused catastrophic damage at the time," said Ralph von Frese, a professor of geological sciences at Ohio State University.

The crater is about 300 miles wide. It was found by looking at differences in density that show up in gravity measurements taken with NASA's GRACE satellites. Researchers spotted a mass concentration, which they call a mascon—dense stuff that welled up from the mantle, likely in an impact.

"If I saw this same mascon signal on the Moon, I'd expect to see a crater around it," Frese said. (The Moon, with no atmosphere, retains a record of ancient impacts in the visible craters there.)

So Frese and colleagues overlaid data from airborne radar images that showed a 300-mile wide sub-surface, circular ridge. The mascon fit neatly inside the circle.

"And when we looked at the ice-probing airborne radar, there it was," he said today.

The Permian-Triassic extinction, as it is known, wiped out most life on land and in the oceans. Researchers have long suspected a space rock might have been involved. Some scientists have blamed volcanic activity or other culprits.

The die-off set up conditions that eventually allowed dinosaurs to rule the planet.

The newfound crater is more than twice the size of the Chicxulub crater in the Yucatan peninsula, which marks the impact that may have ultimately killed the dinosaurs 65 million years ago. The Chicxulub space rock is thought to have been 6 miles wide, while the Wilkes Land meteor could have been up to 30 miles wide, the researchers said.

The work was financed by NASA and the National Science Foundation. The discovery, announced today, was initially presented in a poster paper at the recent American Geophysical Union Joint Assembly meeting in Baltimore.

The researchers say further work is needed to confirm the finding. One way to do that would be to go there and collect rock from the crater to see if its structure matches what would be expected from such a colossal impact.

What happened to the "insert favorite mass global extinction theory" Well I guess just about any humongous crater can be used to infer a mass extinction at just about any point in time that a particular subset of 'scientists' might find it convenient to. Grab hold of the fossil set you need from the bin of eternity, apply some creative dating techniques to it to get your theory into the desired range(toss out the ones you dont like for the moment), then back to the fossil record again to get evidence/give some evidence back and viola! you have your next greatest mass extinction! Now to cinch the deal, we will go to the 'dna record'. This is after of course we filter out all the 'junk dna information' and let's brush aside that probability that the complex dna molecules just might be corrupted and altered in ways we cant see much less imagine in the extraction process.

Just out of curiosity, are you really under the impression that repeatedly lying about how this kind of science is actually done will increase the credibility of the anti-science slanders of you and your creationist buddies?

Because if so, I have to inform you that it's not working the way you intend it to.

Ignorance is curable, but the afflicted has to want to be cured.

Mammal-Like Reptiles

As previously stated, a succession of transitional fossils exists that link reptiles (Class Reptilia) and mammals (Class Mammalia). These particular reptiles are classifie as Subclass Synapsida. Presently, this is the best example of th e transformation of one major higher taxon into another. The morphologic changes that took place are well documented by fossils, beginning with animals essentially 100% reptilian and resulting in animals essentially 100% mammalian. Therefore, I have chosen this as the example to summarize in more detail (Table 1, Fig. 1).

Comparisons

M. Eyes = ?

Nose = ?

Teeth incisors = ?

K. Eyes = ?

Nose = pointy

Teeth incisors = smaller fangs

J. Eyes = Medium

Nose = stubby

Teeth incisors = BIGGER fangs

I. Eyes = Medium

Nose = more pointy

Teeth incisors = big fangs

H. Eyes = Bigger

Nose = more blunt

Teeth incisors = Even more

G. Eyes = real SMALL

Nose = Real pointy

Teeth incisors = More

F. Eyes = Smaller

Nose = Blunt

Teeth incisors = Thin, less

E. Eyes = HUGE!

Nose = pointy, again

Teeth incisors = Smaller

D. Eyes = Smaller

Nose = Holes bigger

Teeth incisors = Bigger

C. Eyes = Huge, again!

Nose = broader

Teeth incisors = very small

B. Eyes = less huge

Nose = narrower

Teeth incisors = ??

A. Eyes = big

Nose = rounded

Teeth incisors = small

Skulls and jaws of synapsid reptiles and mammals; left column side view of skull; center column top view of skull; right column side view of lower jaw. Hylonomus modified from Carroll (1964, Figs. 2,6; 1968, Figs. 10-2, 10-5; note that Hylonomus is a protorothyrod, not a synapsid). Archaeothyris modified from Reisz (1972, Fig. 2). Haptodus modified from Currie (1977, Figs, 1a, 1b; 1979, Figs. 5a, 5b). Sphenacodo n modified from Romer & Price (1940, Fig. 4f), Allin (1975, p. 3, Fig. 16);note: Dimetrodon substituted for top view; modified from Romer & Price, 1940, pl. 10. Biarmosuchus modified from Ivakhnenko et al. (1997, pl. 65, Figs. 1a, 1B, 2); Alin & Hopson (1992; Fig. 28.4c); Sigogneau & Tchudinov (1972, Figs. 1, 15). Eoarctops modified from Broom (1932, Fig. 35a); Boonstra (1969, Fig. 18). Pristerognathus modified from Broom (1932, Figs 17a, b,c); Boonstra (1963, Fig. 5d). Procynosuchus modified from Allin & Hopson (1992, Fig. 28.4e); Hopson (1987, Fig. 5c); Brink (1963, Fig. 10a); Kemp (1979, Fig. 1); Allin (1975, p. 3, Fig. 14). Thrinaxodon modified from Allin & Hopson (1992, Fig. 28.4f);Parrington (1946, Fig. 1); Allin (1975, p. 3, Fig. 13). Probainognathus modified from Allin & Hopson (1992, Fig. 28.4g); Romer (1970, Fig. 1); Allin (1975, p. 3, Fig. 12). Morga nucodon modified from Kermack, Mussett, & Rigney (1981, Figs. 95, 99a; 1973, Fig. 7a); Allin (1975, p. 3, Fig. 11). Asioryctes modified from Carroll (1988, Fig. 20-3b). Abbreviations: ag = angular; ar = articular; cp = coronoid process; d = dentary; f = lateral temporal fenestra; j = jugal; mm = attachment site for mammalian jaw muscles; o = eye socket; po = post orbital; q = quadrate; rl = reflected lamina; sq = squamosal; ty = tympanic. .

Are you convinced yet?

Oscillating eye sizes,

head shapes that shift back and forth,

teeth that are large, then small, then large again.

Yeah; I believe this stuff!

(The chart is from The Fossil Record: Evolution or "Scientific Creation" by Clifford A. Cuffey. It is on part 5 of a multipart article. The beginning of the article is here. )

There are some Evo's who think... "It effectively demolishes the entire creationist argument. Excellent reading!"

After seeing these pix; do you?

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Show me duh money!!!