EARTH has a peculiar ‘heartbeat’ that thumps every 27 million years, researchers have found.
This heartbeat is characterized by volcanic eruptions, mass extinctions, and sea level changes, according to the researchers of a 2021 study.
“Many geologists believe that geological events are random over time,” Michael Rampino, a New York University geologist and the study’s lead author, in a statement from 2021.
“But our study provides statistical evidence for a common cycle, suggesting that these geologic events are correlated and not random.”
Using radio-isotopic dating techniques, the scientists were able to get some insight into Earth’s geologic timescale.
Specifically, Rampino and his colleagues were able to analyze 89 major geological events over the last 260 million years.
These events include marine and land extinctions, volcanic eruptions, and events when oceans were depleted of oxygen.
After analyzing these events, they found that they generally clustered at 10 different time points over 260 million years.
Most notably, they occurred in pulses of roughly 27.5 million years apart.
The most recent cluster of geological events was around 7 million years ago.
This means that the next thump is expected in around 20 million years or so.
It’s not certain, but the researchers believe that these pulses may be a function of plate tectonics or astronomical cycles.
Plate tectonics is the process by which the Earth’s crust is constantly moving and changing.
Astronomical cycles are the regular patterns of motion of the Earth and other planets in the solar system.
“Whatever the origins of these cyclical episodes, our findings support the case for a largely periodic, coordinated, and intermittently catastrophic geologic record, which is a departure from the views held by many geologists,” explained Rampino.
