Theory – Meteorites helped form the continents

Fragment of a meteorite (Deutschlandradio/ Dieter Heinlein)

An Australian team has evidence of this collectedthat meteorites that hit the earth billions of years ago fundamentally changed the surface of the planet. The scientists examined rock samples from Western Australia. The continental crust there is several billion years old. There were also certain crystals in the samples.

Through them, the researchers were able to find out that the heat that affected the earth’s crust probably came from above first. This suggests that meteorites actually caused the earth’s crust to partially melt and form again.

This fits in with the hypothesis that around four billion years ago there were a particularly large number of impacts on Earth because the solar system was still developing at that time and there were therefore more rocks in space.

This message was broadcast on Deutschlandfunk on August 17, 2022.