> <i>“Before the impact, there was some, but not much, life in the oceans due to the lack of nutrients and electron donors such as iron in the shallow water,” she said. “The impact released essential nutrients, such as phosphorus, on a global scale. A student aptly called this impact a ‘fertilizer bomb. [...]”</i><p>> <i>Drabon and her colleagues conducted fieldwork to search for clues in the rocks of the Barberton Makhonjwa Mountains of South Africa. There, geological evidence of eight impact events, which occurred between 3.6 billion and 3.2 billion years ago, can be found in the rocks and traced through tiny meteorite impact particles called spherules.</i><p>> <i>The S2 meteorite was between 23 and 36 miles (37 and 58 kilometers) in diameter as it struck the planet.</i><p>> <i>“There are no impact craters preserved on the Earth today that come anywhere near in size to what has been inferred to have produced the rocks studied here,”</i>