This book is the first volume of a new interdisciplinary series on "Impact Studies". The volumes of this series aim to include all aspects of research related to impact cratering - geology, geophysics, paleontology, geochemistry, mineralogy, petrology, planetolgy, etc. Future volumes will include monographs, field guides, conference proceedings, etc. All contributions in this book were peer-reviewed to ensure high scientific quality. The thirteen papers in the present volume result from a workshop of the European Science Foundation (ESF) IMPACT programme ("Response of the Earth System to Impact Processes"). This programme is an interdisciplinary effort aimed at understanding impact processes and their effects on the Earth System, including environmental, biological, and geological changes, and consequences for the biodiversity of ecosystems. The goals of the programme, and details about our activities, can be found on the web at . The IMPACT programme has currently 15 member nations from allover Europe. The activities of the programme range from workshops to specific topics regarding impact cratering, short courses on impact stratigraphy, shock metamorphism, etc. , mobility grants for students and young researchers, development of teaching aids, and publications. The third IMPACT workshop was held in Quillan, in the foothills of the French Pyrenees, in September 1999.

In this volume, the geologic and planetary science communities explore impact events and how they affected the evolution of Earth and other planetary bodies. these papers are the outcome of a conference held every five years.

The biological effects of asteroid and comet impacts have been widely viewed as primarily destructive. The role of an impactor in the K/T boundary extinctions has had a particularly important influence on thinking concerning the role of impacts in ecological and biological changes. th During the 10 and final workshop of the ESF IMPACT program during March 2003, we sought to investigate the wider aspects of the involvement of impact events in biological processes, including the beneficial role of these events from the prebiotic through to the ecosystem level. The ESF IMPACT programme (1998-2003) was an interdisciplinary effort that is aimed at understanding impact processes and their effects on the Earth environment, including environmental, geological and biological changes. The IMPACT programme has 15 member states and the activities of the programme range from workshops to short courses on topics such as impact stratigraphy, shock metamorphism, etc. The program has also awarded mobility grants and been involved in the development of teaching aids and numerous publications, including this one.

"Comprises articles stemming from the March 2013 international conference at London's Natural History Museum. Researchers across geological, geophysical, and biological disciplines present key results from research concerning the causes of mass extinction events"--

Impact cratering is an important geological process on all solid planetary bodies, and, in the case of Earth, may have had major climatic and biological effects. Most terrestrial impact craters have been erased or modified beyond recognition. However, major impacts throw ejecta over large areas of the Earth's surface. Recognition of these impact ejecta layers can help fill in the gaps in the terrestrial cratering record and at the same time provide direct correlation between major impacts and other geological events, such as climatic changes and mass extinctions. This book provides the first summary of known distal impact ejecta layers

In 1980, the science world was stunned when a maverick team of researchers proposed that a massive meteor strike had wiped the dinosaurs and other fauna from the Earth 66 million years ago. Scientists found evidence for this theory in a “crater of doom” on the Yucatán Peninsula, showing that our planet had once been a target in a galactic shooting gallery. In Cataclysms, Michael R. Rampino builds on the latest findings from leading geoscientists to take “neocatastrophism” a step further, toward a richer understanding of the science behind major planetary upheavals and extinction events. Rampino recounts his conversion to the impact hypothesis, describing his visits to meteor-strike sites and his review of the existing geological record. The new geology he outlines explicitly rejects nineteenth-century “uniformitarianism,” which casts planetary change as gradual and driven by processes we can see at work today. Rampino offers a cosmic context for Earth’s geologic evolution, in which cataclysms from above in the form of comet and asteroid impacts and from below in the form of huge outpourings of lava in flood-basalt eruptions have led to severe and even catastrophic changes to the Earth’s surface. This new geology sees Earth’s position in our solar system and galaxy as the keys to understanding our planet’s geology and history of life. Rampino concludes with a controversial consideration of dark matter’s potential as a triggering mechanism, exploring its role in heating Earth’s core and spurring massive volcanism throughout geologic time.