Frontier Scientists

2 Comments Posted on February 28th, 2011 by admin

Where is Lake El’gygytgyn?

Lake El’gygytgyn, formed by an astroid impact about 3.6 million years ago, gives scientists climate change clues via an extracted sediment core.

Among the many challenges facing the scientific community is determining why and how the Arctic climate system evolved from a warm forested ecosystem into a cold permafrost ecosystem. The Arctic region suffered this climate change sometime between 2 million and 3 million years ago during the mid-to-late Pliocene.

Now scientists are unlocking clues from the rocks of Lake El’Gygytgyn, a site where 3.6 million years ago an asteroid impacted the earth. The continuous depositional record scientists are studying from the site of the lake will provide, for the first time, an Arctic terrestrial perspective, reflecting new information of the mechanisms and dynamics of glacial-interglacial and millennial-scale change in the high-latitude region.

[ video ] JBG Describes Research at Lake E
[ video ] Core Details
[ video ] Core Correlation Challenges
[ video ] _Video In Production_ Leaf Wax, How It Answers Part of the Puzzle
[ video ] What a 3.6 Million Year Earth Core Reveals
[ video ] The Center of the Bering Land Bridge
[ video ] The Thrill To Drill In The Chill

✧Sunken Treasure under Lake El’gygytgyn
✧“This is not what we expected” ~ Julie Brigham-Grette in video describing work at Lake El’gygytgyn.
✧Arctic lakes getting a closer look
✧International Polar Week and Climate Predictions in Ice

Find much more on FrontierScientists, including Climate Change Watch

2 Responses to “Where is Lake El’gygytgyn?”

Carol Bogdasarian on September 1st, 2011 4:10 pm:

What happened geologically at the opposite side of the earth at the time of the impact at Lake El’Gygytgyn?

Tim Martin on June 12th, 2012 12:14 pm:

@Carol, writing as a member of the expedition.

Although the impact that formed Lake E certainly was a major shock to the nearby environment, It was not large enough to have global impact or consequence. Near by, much of the earth would have been scorched due to the energy release of the impact. It is estimated that the crater itself may have been hot for centuries. Regionally the area would have been covered by ejecta and the numerous local faults indicate that the impact shattered and melted surrounding rocks. These effects would have been limitted to Chukotka (NE Russia)

More about the impact may be read here: http://www.univie.ac.at/geochemistry/koeberl/publikation_list/294-Elgygytgyn-structure-MAPS2007.pdf