The briefest and funnest phrase that describes the event that settled around the globe and is glaze on this piece: "Dinosaur-killing cloud of extraterrestrial dust from the K-T Band." This sample is sediment from 30°19.9’ north 157°49.4’ west 3100 to 3115 meters deep, said to contain asteroid particles. From ship LongLines cruise 44, October 1976, Leg #1. I have this material because I made a gift to honor the studies of muds, and to memorialize Charley Hollister. I was given this material for a piece I made and donated to the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution. There are some papers for provenance that will accompany the piece -- a map and a ship log. Iridium, a very rare element in the Earth's crust, is found in anomalously high concentrations in a thin geological soil layer called the Cretaceous-Tertiary boundary (often abbreviated the K-T boundary) world wide. Iridium is known to be abundant in asteroids and comet bodies, and is generally taken as evidence of a large impact about 65 million years ago, which spread Iridium-rich dust around the world. Google "iridium anomoly" for more information about this material, taken from the first core sample known to contain it. |