Saw this story at Science-a-GoGo and wondered why it wasn’t being reported more widely:
A new computer model of our solar system’s movement relative to the Milky Way indicates that it “bounces” up and down through the plane of the galaxy; a cycle that scientists say is a “beautiful match” with the mass extinction events that occur periodically on Earth.
Writing in the Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, the scientists at the Cardiff Centre for Astrobiology that built the computer model say that during certain periods in the bounce, gravitational forces from surrounding gas and dust clouds could dislodge comets from their paths. These comets could then plunge into our solar system, some of them colliding with the Earth.
Worth noting is that one of the scientists involved, Professor Chandra Wickramasinghe, is a pioneer of the theory of Panspermia. Just now he’s added a bit of “destroying life” to his theory of “seeding life” I guess!
Though the story ends with the apocalyptic hint that we’re due for another ‘bounce’, at least with the 35 million year time frame the phrase “give or take a million” has some serious meaning…
