Speaker 1: Welcome to brain Stuff, a production of I Heart Radio,
Speaker 1: Hey brain Stuff Lauren vogelbam Here. It might seem like
Speaker 1: geologists are just studying a bunch of old rocks, and
Speaker 1: sometimes really old rocks, but the reality is that Earth
Speaker 1: science researchers look back at the geologic record of our
Speaker 1: planet to understand how we got here and what we
Speaker 1: can expect next for Earth and the life that lives
Speaker 1: here humans. Included in a study published in the journal
Speaker 1: Geoscience Frontiers in November, researchers from New York and California
Speaker 1: helped pinpoint an important fact about our planet that has
Speaker 1: huge implications for us. Our Earth has a pulse, or
Speaker 1: regular peaks of geologic activity. They identified the pulse in
Speaker 1: part by looking at mass extinctions, something we obviously want
Speaker 1: to know about since this is the only planet our
Speaker 1: species currently calls home. The results of the study are
Speaker 1: actually not new. They are just a more specific measurement
Speaker 1: that tries to answer a question researchers have been asking
Speaker 1: for nearly a century. A past research suggested that each
Speaker 1: of Earth's pulses was between twenty six point four and
Speaker 1: thirty million years apart. This study narrows that down further.
Speaker 1: In this new study, the researchers used the latest technology
Speaker 1: to analyze eighty nine geologic events in the past two
Speaker 1: hundred and sixty million years of Earth's history, employing a
Speaker 1: statistical technique called Fourier analysis to determine whether there was
Speaker 1: any pattern in the frequency and consistency of the data.
Speaker 1: When all the numbers were crunched, it turns out there
Speaker 1: is a pattern, and it falls exactly within the range
Speaker 1: proposed by previous researchers. Across these eighty nine events, which
Speaker 1: the authors wrote, included marine and non marine extinctions, ocean
Speaker 1: and oxic events, sea level oscillations, continental flood basalt eruptions,
Speaker 1: and pulses of intraplate magnetism. They found ten clusters of
Speaker 1: data points. These geological events ocurred roughly every twenty seven
Speaker 1: point five million years. While it's certainly fascinating to have
Speaker 1: more evidence that there's a consistent rhythm to cycles of
Speaker 1: activity and life on Earth, the researchers in the study
Speaker 1: aren't much closer to understanding why Earth has a pulse.
Speaker 1: The authors do propose some ideas, though, One suggests that
Speaker 1: internal forces within and on the planet Earth, including magma activity,
Speaker 1: tectonic activity and climate change may explain the cyclical pattern.
Speaker 1: Other ideas point to consistent changes in our planets orbital cycles,
Speaker 1: and the fact that our solar system also has a
Speaker 1: cyclical movement within the Milky Way galaxy roughly every thirty
Speaker 1: million years. And yet another theory suggests that it may
Speaker 1: have to do with dark matter in the universe. Several
Speaker 1: researchers have proposed that increased dark matter may account for
Speaker 1: increased astronomical activity like meteors and asteroids, as well as
Speaker 1: volcanic activity on Earth. These can lead to mass extinction
Speaker 1: events like those measured in the study. Those scientists still
Speaker 1: have a lot to learn about dark matter before they
Speaker 1: can begin to determine if this is a viable cause
Speaker 1: for the pulse on our planet. No matter the cause,
Speaker 1: this study suggests that the data is conclusive. Every twenty
Speaker 1: seven point five million years, we can expect an uptick
Speaker 1: in geologic activity, which often results in mass extinction. Don't worry, though,
Speaker 1: because twenty seven point five million years is a very
Speaker 1: long time for human kind on the scale of planetary history.
Speaker 1: This time frame is brief, but our species is believed
Speaker 1: to be only about two hundred thousand years old. That's
Speaker 1: less than one percent of the time between pulses, and
Speaker 1: we are between pulses right now. The study suggests that
Speaker 1: the next pulse will be roughly twenty million years in
Speaker 1: the future. For context, while dinosaurs, when extinct roughly sixty
Speaker 1: five million years ago, commonly recognized modern animals like bears, pros,
Speaker 1: and whales were only just emerging on the evolutionary timeline
Speaker 1: twenty million years ago. Today's episode is based on the
Speaker 1: article turns out Earth's pulse beats every twenty seven point
Speaker 1: five million years, but why? On how stuff works dot Com,
Speaker 1: written by Valerie Stymap. Brain Stuff is production of I
Speaker 1: Heart Radio in partnership with how stuff Works dot Com,
Speaker 1: and it's produced by Tyler Clang. For more podcasts from
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Speaker 1: or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.