20 March 2006

Dinosaur extinction could have seeded Titan

Sclerotic-rings pointed out a BBC article stating that the asteroid that caused the dinosaurs' mass extinction could've blasted rocks into space that could've eventually hit both Titan and Europa.

Asked after his presentation by one scientist whether he thought microbes would be able to survive Titan's freezing temperatures, Dr Gladman answered: "That's for you people to decide, I'm just the pizza delivery boy."


Gladman also checked landing velocities to determine theoretical heating: the <100 rocks to Europa hit too fast, while the <20 rocks to Titan might've made it. The one thing BBC didn't note was that Gladman's talk was submitted, not peer reviewed, but it took some digging for me to find.

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