New research: Giant meteorite impacts created continents

Subject: Science and Technology

Section :Space

Context:

A new Curtin University study has found the most robust evidence yet showing that Earth’s continents were formed by giant meteorite impacts. The paper, ‘Giant impacts and the origin and evolution of continents’, was published in Nature on August 10.
By examining tiny crystals of the mineral zircon in rocks from the Pilbara Craton in Western Australia, which represents Earth’s best-preserved remnant of ancient crust, we found evidence of these giant meteorite impacts.
Studying the composition of oxygen isotopes in these zircon crystals revealed a ‘top-down’ process starting with the melting of rocks near the surface and progressing deeper, consistent with the geological effect of giant meteorite impacts. University research provides the first solid evidence that the processes that ultimately formed the continents began with giant meteorite impacts

What’s the Difference Between a Meteoroid, a Meteor, and a Meteorite?

Meteoroids are objects in space that range in size from dust grains to small asteroids.Most are pieces of other, larger bodies that have been broken or blasted off. These come from comets, asteroids, planets and the Moon.
When meteoroids enter Earth’s atmosphere (or that of another planet, like Mars) at high speed and burn up, the fireballs or “shooting stars” are called meteors.
When a meteoroid survives its journey through the atmosphere and hits the ground, it’s called a meteorite.