Surficial geology of the Chicxulub impact crater, Yucatan, Mexico.
Earth Moon Planets
; 63: 93-104, 1993.
Article
em En
| MEDLINE
| ID: mdl-11539441
The Chicxulub impact crater in northwestern Yucatan, Mexico is the primary candidate for the proposed impact that caused mass extinctions at the end of the Cretaceous Period. The crater is buried by up to a kilometer of Tertiary sediment and the most prominent surface expression is a ring of sink holes, known locally as cenotes, mapped with Landsat imagery. This 165 +/- 5 km diameter Cenote Ring demarcates a boundary between unfractured limestones inside the ring, and fractured limestones outside. The boundary forms a barrier to lateral ground water migration, resulting in increased flows, dissolution, and collapse thus forming the cenotes. The subsurface geology indicates that the fracturing that created the Cenote Ring is related to slumping in the rim of the buried crater, differential thicknesses in the rocks overlying the crater, or solution collapse within porous impact deposits. The Cenote Ring provides the most accurate position of the Chicxulub crater's center, and the associated faults, fractures, and stratigraphy indicate that the crater may be approximately 240 km in diameter.
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Base de dados:
MEDLINE
Assunto principal:
Paleontologia
/
Sedimentos Geológicos
/
Evolução Planetária
/
Geologia
País/Região como assunto:
Mexico
Idioma:
En
Revista:
Earth Moon Planets
Ano de publicação:
1993
Tipo de documento:
Article
País de afiliação:
Estados Unidos
País de publicação:
Holanda