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Artist's depiction of the end-Cretaceous impact eventSince the 19th century, a significant amount of research has been conducted on the Cretaceous–Paleogene extinction event, the mass extinction that ended the dinosaur-dominated Mesozoic Era and set the stage for the Age of Mammals, or Cenozoic Era.
It marked the end of the Cretaceous period, and with it the Mesozoic era, while heralding the beginning of the current era, the Cenozoic. In the geologic record , the K–Pg event is marked by a thin layer of sediment called the K–Pg boundary, Fatkito boundary or K–T boundary , which can be found throughout the world in marine and ...
The Cretaceous (IPA: / k r ɪ ˈ t eɪ ʃ ə s / krih-TAY-shəss) [2] is a geological period that lasted from about 143.1 to 66 million years ago (Mya). It is the third and final period of the Mesozoic Era, as well as the longest.
c. 66.038 ± 0.011 Ma – Cretaceous-Paleogene extinction event at the end of the Cretaceous Period marks the end of the Mesozoic era and the age of the dinosaurs; start of the Paleogene Period and the current Cenozoic era.
The Cenozoic Era covers the 66 million years since the Cretaceous–Paleogene extinction event up to and including the present day. By the end of the Mesozoic era, the continents had rifted into nearly their present form.
The Paleocene climate was, much like in the Cretaceous, tropical or subtropical, [71] [72] [73] and the poles were temperate, [74] with an average global temperature of roughly 24–25 °C (75–77 °F). [75] For comparison, the average global temperature for the period between 1951 and 1980 was 14 °C (57 °F). [76]
The Maastrichtian (/ m ɑː ˈ s t r ɪ k t i ə n / mahss-TRIK-tee-ən) is, in the International Commission on Stratigraphy (ICS) geologic timescale, the latest age (uppermost stage) of the Late Cretaceous Epoch or Upper Cretaceous Series, the Cretaceous Period or System, and of the Mesozoic Era or Erathem. It spanned the interval from .
The first breakthrough was published in 1980 by a team led by Luis Alvarez, who discovered trace metal evidence for an asteroid impact at the end of the Cretaceous period. The Alvarez hypothesis for the end-Cretaceous extinction gave mass extinctions, and catastrophic explanations, newfound popular and scientific attention. [46]