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Cometary impacts and ice-ages

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Abstract

Cycles of glaciation with an average period of ∼ 100 kyr are mediatedby impacts of cometary bolides. Ice-age conditions are dry and dusty withlow rates of precipitation. Comets in the mass range 1015 -1016 gimpacting the oceans could release enough water vapour into the atmosphereto enhance a depleted greenhouse effect. The energy deposited in the oceanswould also warm the surface layers, thus starting up anevaporation-precipitation cycle which ushers in warmer interglacialinterludes. The latter have neutral stability and are necessarilyshort-lived, eventually drifting back to glacial conditions on timescalesof ∼ 10 kyr.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Mathematics, Cardiff University, Cardiff, CF2 4YH, UK

    Fred Hoyle & Chandra Wickramasinghe

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  1. Fred Hoyle
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  2. Chandra Wickramasinghe
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Hoyle, F., Wickramasinghe, C. Cometary impacts and ice-ages. Astrophysics and Space Science 275, 367–376 (2001). https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1002717413720

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1002717413720

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