Chicxulub impact space ejecta biomass survival estimation
66 million years ago, a 10km-wide asteroid struck Earth, and created what is known as the Chicxulub crater in Mexico. The crater is estimated to be 200 km in diameter and 20 km in depth1. It is widely accepted that it is the cause of the Cretaceous–Paleogene extinction event that caused the extinction of all non-avian dinosaurs.
As a result of that impact, a large amount of material was ejected into space1. Some of that material was bacteria and other organisms. Some of those can survive exposure to outer space for years23, and thus it is hypothesized that some amount of biomass landed alive on a habitable planet or moon in our solar system, such as Mars, Europa, Enceladus, Titan, Ganymede, or Callisto. The goal of this project is to test this hypothesis.
P(live biomass from Chicxulub impact landed on habitable planet or moon) = ?
