QUIZ - 3.15.13

1. Have we ever witnessed a major impact?

• YES, the most recent major impact happened in 1994. Fragments of comet SL9 hit Jupiter.

2. Did an impact kill the dinosaurs?

• YES, an iridium layer just about dinosaur fossils suggests that an impact caused mass extinction 65 million years ago. A large crater of that age has been found in Mexico.

3. Is the impact threat a real danger or just media hype?

• Large impacts do happen, but they are rare. They can cause major extinctions about every 100 million years.

4. How do other planets affect impact rates and life on Earth?

• Jovian Planets sometimes deflect comets toward Earth but send many more out to the Oort Cloud.

5. Which chapter of "The Universe Within", deals with the Chicxulub event?

• Chapter # 7 , from "The Universe Within", deals with the Chicxulub event.

6. Who was Luis Alvarez?

• Luis Walter Alvarez was an American experimental physicist and inventor, who was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1968. With his son, geologist Walter Alvarez, proposed the Alvarez Hypothesis. The Alvarez Hypothesis sought to explain the extinction event that wiped out the dinosaurs as the result of an asteroid impact.

7. Who was Walter Alvarez?

• Walter Alvarez was is a professor in the Earth and Planetary Science department at the University of California, Berkeley. He is most widely known for the theory that dinosaurs were killed by an asteroid impact. He developed this theory in collaboration with his father, Nobel Prize winning physicist Luis Alvarez.

8. What is SL9?

• SL9, also know as Comet Shoemaker - Levy 9 (D/1993 F2) was a comet that broke apart and collided with Jupiter in July 1994, providing the first direct observation of an extraterrestrial collision of Solar System objects.

9. Which planet of the solar system has the biggest mass, and therefore changes orbits of asteroids and comets the most?

• The planet of the solar system that has the biggest mass, and therefore changes orbits of asteroids and comets the most is Jupiter.

10. Where do interlopers to the inner solar system more likely get thrown out?

• Interlopes pass once through the inner solar system before getting thrown out.