The dinosaurs' demise up close
Friday, February 7, 2014 - 06:30
in Paleontology & Archaeology
Tourists flock to Italy to see Michelangelo's David and other iconic hunks of Renaissance stone, but in a trip over spring break, a group of Columbia students got to visit rocks that have shaped the world in even more profound ways. In the limestone outcrops of Italy's Apennine Mountains, geologist Walter Alvarez collected some of the earliest evidence that a massive fireball falling from space some 66 million years ago was responsible for killing off the dinosaurs. Geologists have trekked to the region since then to study that catastrophic event as well as others imprinted in these rocks.