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Concept
Popigai impact structure
Summary
The Popigai impact structure is the eroded remnant of an impact crater in northern Siberia, Russia. It is tied with the Manicouagan structure as the fourth largest verified impact structure on Earth. A large bolide impact created the diameter crater approximately 35 million years ago during the late Eocene epoch (Priabonian stage). It might be linked to the Eocene–Oligocene extinction event.
The structure is east from the outpost of Khatanga and northeast of the city of Norilsk, NNE of the Anabar Plateau. It is designated by UNESCO as a Geopark, a site of special geological heritage. There is a small possibility that the Popigai impact crater may have formed simultaneously with the approximately 35-million-year-old Chesapeake Bay and Toms Canyon impact craters.
For decades, the Popigai impact structure has fascinated paleontologists and geologists, but the entire area was completely off limits because of the diamonds found there. However, a major investigatory expedition was undertaken in 1997, which greatly advanced understanding of the structure. The impactor is suggested to have been a H chondrite asteroid based on ejecta layers from Italy, with the impactor thought to have been several kilometeres in diameter.
The shock pressures from the impact instantaneously transformed graphite in the ground into diamonds within a radius of the impact point. These diamonds are usually in diameter, though a few exceptional specimens are in size. The diamonds inherited the tabular shape of the original graphite grains and also the original crystals' delicate striations.
Most modern industrial diamonds are produced synthetically. The diamond deposits at Popigai have not been mined because of the remote location and lack of infrastructure, and are unlikely to be competitive with synthetic diamonds. Many of the diamonds at Popigai contain crystalline lonsdaleite, an allotrope of carbon that has a hexagonal lattice. Pure, laboratory-created lonsdaleite is up to 58% harder than ordinary diamonds.
Official source
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