„William Frederick Bottke“ – Versionsunterschied

In 2007, Bottke published a paper in [[Nature (journal)|Nature]] (with David Vokrouhlický and David Nesvorný), proposing that the asteroid that produced the [[Chicxulub Crater]] and caused the [[Cretaceous–Paleogene extinction event|Cretaceous mass extinction]] (although the latter is still contended) formed during an asteroid breakup in the [[main asteroid belt]] approximately 160 million years ago.<ref>[http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v449/n7158/abs/nature06070.html An asteroid breakup 160[thinsp&#93;Myr ago as the probable source of the K/T impactor : Abstract : Nature<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref> Bottke and his collaborators base this on a model for the evolution of the [[Baptistina]] [[asteroid family]], in which fragments from the collision that formed the family migrate throughout the inner solar system. They date the event based on the current orbits of Baptistina family members, and then compute the orbital evolution of smaller (few-km) objects produced in the collision, and conclude that the [[Cretaceous–Paleogene boundary|Chicxulub impact]] or was one such object. They also propose that [[Tycho (lunar crater)|Tycho crater]] on the [[Moon]] was created by an object produced in the same collision.