After the asteroid impact that wiped out the dinosaurs, life seems to have bounced back with surprising speed. The first wave of marine species emerged within a few thousand years of the mass extinction, a new study finds. That’s many millennia faster than many scientists thought.
“This really helps us understand how quickly species can evolve,” says Christopher Lowery. He works at the University of Texas at Austin. There, he studies the physical and biological features of ancient oceans.
The Chicxulub (CHEEK-shuh-loob) asteroid struck Earth 66 million years ago. Studying its aftermath provides a rare chance to learn how past ecosystems rebounded from disaster, Lowery says.
And the new findings mean scientists need to rethink how fast evolution can rebuild a diversity of life. That may be important as climate change and other human actions speed Earth toward ecosystem upheavals.
Settling timelines
The new clues come from fossils of organisms known as foraminif...
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