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Introduction
Additional affiliations
August 2012 - July 2013
January 1999 - December 2001
May 2004 - August 2017
Education
January 1999 - December 2002
Publications
Publications (121)
The aim of the study is to evaluate fluids circulation through the Chicxulub crater, and to determine the composition of hydrothermal fluids after the impact. Rock-Eval pyrolysis and fluid inclusion micro-thermometry analyses were performed. The technique has been routinely used for about fifteen years and has become a standard tool for hydrocarbon...
The Chicxulub impact caused a crash in productivity in the world's oceans which contributed to the extinction of ∼75% of marine species. In the immediate aftermath of the extinction, export productivity was locally highly variable, with some sites, including the Chicxulub crater, recording elevated export production. The long-term transition back t...
The Chicxulub impact led to the formation of a ~ 200-km wide by ~1-km deep crater on México's Yucatán Peninsula. Over a period of hours after the impact the ocean re-entered and covered the impact basin beneath several hundred meters of water. A suite of impactites were deposited across the crater during crater formation, and by the resurge, tsunam...
The mineral apatite, Ca 5 (PO 4) 3 (F,Cl,OH), is a ubiquitous accessory mineral, with its volatile content and isotopic compositions used to interpret the evolution of H 2 O on planetary bodies. During hypervelocity impact, extreme pressures shock target rocks resulting in deformation of minerals; however, relatively few microstructural studies of...
We measured dissolved inorganic nitrogen (DIN = NH 4 + + NO x [= NO 3 − + NO 2 − ]), soluble reactive phosphorous (SRP), and ecological indicators (chlorophyll-a concentration, coverage of submerged aquatic vegetation, and %N, C:N and δ 15 N values in the seagrass Thalassia testudinum) to evaluate the effects of nutrient enrichment at three shallow...
The Late Paleozoic tectono-magmatic history and basement of the Maya block are poorly understood due to the lack of exposures of coeval magmatic rocks in the region. Recently, IODP-ICDP Expedition 364 recovered drill core samples at borehole M0077A from the peak ring of the Chicxulub impact crater, offshore of the Yucatán peninsula in the Gulf of M...
The ~180-km-diameter Chicxulub peak-ring crater and ~240-km multiring basin, produced by the impact that terminated the Cretaceous, is the largest remaining intact impact basin on Earth. International Ocean Discovery Program (IODP) and International Continental Scientific Drilling Program (ICDP) Expedition 364 drilled to a depth of 1335 m below the...
The environmental severity of large impacts on Earth is influenced by their impact trajectory. Impact direction and angle to the target plane affect the volume and depth of origin of vaporized target, as well as the trajectories of ejected material. The asteroid impact that formed the 66 Ma Chicxulub crater had a profound and catastrophic effect on...
The South China Sea, located at the transition between the Pacific and the Indian Ocean, receives every year, mainly during the rain season, enormous amounts of river sediments originating from the erosion/weathering of rocks in the catchment basins. At sea, these sediments are carried by different water masses to their deposition site and they con...
The Late Paleozoic tectono-magmatic history and basement of the Maya block are poorly understood due to the lack of exposures of coeval magmatic rocks in the region. Recently, IODP-ICDP Expedition 364 recovered drill core samples at borehole M0077A from the peak ring of the Chicxulub impact crater, offshore of the Yucatán peninsula in the Gulf of M...
Thermal stress on the biosphere during the extreme warmth of the Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum (PETM) was most severe at low latitudes, with sea surface temperatures at some localities exceeding the 35 • C at which marine organisms experience heat stress. Relatively few equivalent terrestrial sections have been identified, and the response of la...
The zircon U-Pb system is one of the most robust geochronometers, but during an impact event individual crystals can be affected differently by the passage of the shock wave and impact generated heat. Unraveling the potentially complex thermal history recorded by zircon crystals that experienced variable levels of shock and heating, as well as addi...
Using electrical resistivity tomography, a conceptual model was created of the west-east region of the aquifer within the Ring of Cenotes, which surrounds the Chicxulub Crater on the Yucatan Peninsula, Mexico. Determining the hydrogeological parameters of an aquifer is vital since they determine flux and hydrodynamic patterns. In karstic environmen...
Coral calcification is expected to decline as atmospheric carbon dioxide concentration increases. We assessed the potential of Porites astreoides, Siderastrea siderea and Porites porites to survive and calcify under acidified conditions in a 2-year field transplant experiment around low pH, low aragonite saturation (Ωarag) submarine springs. Slow-g...
The IODP-ICDP Expedition 364 drilled into the Chicxulub crater, peering inside its well-preserved peak ring. The borehole penetrated a sequence of post-impact carbonates and a unit of suevites and clast-poor impact melt rock at the top of the peak ring. Beneath this sequence, basement rocks cut by pre-impact and impact dykes, with breccias and melt...
Oceanic impact structures and their exploration via scientific drilling.
Deformation is a ubiquitous process that occurs to rocks during impact cratering; thus, quantifying the deformation of those rocks can provide first-order constraints on the process of impact cratering. Until now, specific quantification of the conditions of stress and strain within models of impact cratering has not been compared to structural obs...
Increasing atmospheric carbon dioxide and its dissolution in seawater have reduced ocean pH and carbonate ion concentrations, with potential implications on calcifying organisms. To assess the response of large Caribbean benthic foraminifera to low carbonate saturation conditions, we analyzed benthic foraminifers' abundance and relative distributio...
Evidence for acoustic fluidization in the peak ring rocks of the Chicxulub impact structure.
Expedition 364 was a joint IODP and ICDP mission-specific platform (MSP) expedition to explore the Chicxulub impact crater buried below the surface of the Yucatán continental shelf seafloor. In April and May 2016, this expedition drilled a single borehole at Site M0077 into the crater’s peak ring. Excellent quality cores were recovered from ~ 505 t...
IODP-Expedition 364 Chicxulub Peak Ring Drilling
Joint International Ocean Discovery Program and International Continental Scientific Drilling Program Expedition 364 drilled into the peak ring of the Chicxulub impact crater. We present P-wave velocity, density, and porosity measurements from Hole M0077A that reveal unusual physical properties of the peak-ring rocks. Across the boundary between po...
Increasing atmospheric carbon dioxide and its dissolution in seawater have reduced ocean pH and carbonate ion concentration with potential implications to calcifying organisms. To assess the response of Caribbean benthic foraminifera to low carbonate saturation conditions, we analyzed benthic foraminifera abundance and relative distribution in prox...
The Cretaceous/Palaeogene mass extinction eradicated 76% of species on Earth1,2. It was caused by the impact of an asteroid3,4 on the Yucatán carbonate platform in the southern Gulf of Mexico 66 million years ago 5 , forming the Chicxulub impact crater6,7. After the mass extinction, the recovery of the global marine ecosystem-measured as primary pr...
The aim of the study is to determine the distribution of trace and major elements in the water and in the sediments of the south part of the Bacalar Lagoon and to identify the sources of the trace elements and their changes over time. The western part of the lagoon water column is characterised by high concentrations of Ca²⁺, HCO3⁻ and Sr²⁺, derive...
The chemical characteristics and hydrogeochemical processes that govern the groundwater in the sinkholes ring of the Yucatan Peninsula were assessed. The groundwater of the area studied is of the Ca-Mg-HCO3 type. Local geology (abundance of dolomite) determines Mg²⁺ enrichment relative to Ca²⁺. The absence of seawater intrusion was established. Sin...
The Ring of Cenotes (RC) is an alignment of numerous cenotes (sinkholes) in a semicircular form (with a radius of 100 km) located in northwestern Yucatán, México. The formation roughly coincides with a concentric ring that corresponds to a buried structure, which has been identified as the product of a meteor impact, known as the Chicxulub crater....
Potentially hazardous asteroids and comets have hit Earth throughout its history, with
catastrophic consequences in the case of the Chicxulub impact. Here we reexamine one of the
mechanisms that allow an impact to have a global effect—the release of climate-active gases from
sedimentary rocks. We use the SOVA hydrocode and model ejected materials f...
Sea-level rise should cause salt-water intrusion into coastal aquifers and limit fresh submarine groundwater discharge. Pargos Spring offshore of Puerto Morelos, Quintana Roo, Mexico, intermittently discharges brackish water and allows intrusion of lagoon water with seawater salinity to the aquifer. Lagoon water intrusion occurred when sea level wa...
Submarine landslides occurring along the margins of the Gulf of Mexico (GOM) represent a low-likelihood, but potentially damaging source of tsunamis. New multibeam bathymetry coverage reveals that mass wasting is pervasive along the Yucatán Shelf edge with several large composite landslides possibly removing as much as 70 km3 of the Cenozoic sedime...
Drilling into Chicxulub's formation
The Chicxulub impact crater, known for its link to the demise of the dinosaurs, also provides an opportunity to study rocks from a large impact structure. Large impact craters have “peak rings” that define a complex crater morphology. Morgan et al. looked at rocks from a drilling expedition through the peak rings...
Se presenta un modelo estadístico de la intrusión salina y la estructura que la define en el acuífero al norte de Yucatán. La metodología está basada en técnicas de resistividad eléctrica y electromagnética con las que se obtienen modelos de resistividad del terreno en 1D-2D y la aplicación de modelos estadísticos de estimación. Los resultados mues...
Submarine landslides occurring along the margins of the Gulf of Mexico (GOM) represent a low-likelihood, but potentially damaging source of tsunamis. New multibeam bathymetry coverage reveals that mass wasting is pervasive along the Yucatán Shelf edge with several large composite landslides possibly removing as much as 70 km3 of the Cenozoic sedime...
Ocean acidification is a pervasive threat to coral reef ecosystems, and our understanding of the ecological processes driving patterns in tropical benthic community development in conditions of acidification is limited. We deployed limestone recruitment tiles in low aragonite saturation (Ωarag) waters during an in-situ field experiment at Puerto Mo...
Salinity and pH over time as measured by an autonomous sensor.
Salinity and pH were measured at 15 minute time intervals for a period of 3 months (August-October 2010) for a total of over 5500 data points at a single spring. Salinity is plotted against pH (a), and grouped according to the number of data points occurring in a given salinity range (b...
We present the first multibeam bathymetric maps of the Campeche Escarpment, a Mesozoic carbonate platform in the Gulf of Mexico, which represents the closest Cretaceous-Paleogene (K-Pg) boundary outcrops to the Chicxulub impact structure. The impact of an extraterrestrial-body similar to 65 million years ago on top of this platform is implicated in...
Submarine groundwater discharge (SGD) to the coastal environment along the eastern Yucatan Peninsula, Quintana Roo, Mexico was investigated using a combination of tracer mass balances and analytical solutions. Two distinct submarine groundwater sources including water from the unconfined surficial aquifer discharging at the beach face and water fro...
Submarine groundwater discharge (SGD) to the coastal environment along the eastern Yucatan Peninsula, Quintana Roo, Mexico was investigated using a combination of tracer mass balances and analytical solutions. Two distinct submarine groundwater sources including water from the unconfined surficial aquifer discharging at the beach face and water fro...
As the surface ocean equilibrates with rising atmospheric CO2, the pH of surface seawater is decreasing with potentially negative impacts on coral calcification. A critical question is whether corals will be able to adapt or acclimate to these changes in seawater chemistry. We use high precision CT scanning of skeletal cores of Porites astreoides,...
As the surface ocean equilibrates with rising atmospheric CO2, the pH of surface seawater is decreasing with potentially negative impacts on coral calcification. A critical question is whether corals will be able to adapt or acclimate to these changes in seawater chemistry. We use high precision CT scanning of skeletal cores of Porites astreoides,...
We present the preliminary results of geochemical, stable isotopes and
rock magnetic studies of a stalagmite from a cave in eastern Quintana
Roo, northern Yucatan peninsula. In the past years, there has been
increased interest in understanding the paleoclimatic and
paleoenvironmental evolution of the Yucatan peninsula and northern
Central America,...
The only surface expression of the Chicxulub Impact Crater is a Ring of
Cenotes (sinkholes) whose density varies from several cenotes per
kilometer, to several kilometers between each cenote. This ring has a
radius of approximately 90 km and it is centered at Chicxulub Puerto. It
is not known today whether the Ring of Cenotes is the surface express...
We present the initial results of a low-altitude high-resolution
aeromagnetic study over the Yucatan peninsula. Area surveyed extends
from 86W to 91W and 18N to 21N, covering the peninsula and adjacent
continental margin of Gulf of Mexico and Caribbean Sea. Aeromagnetic
surveys are integrated into a regional map, and regional and residual
anomalies...
Coral reef ecosystems are currently threatened by anthropogenic loading
of CO2 to the atmosphere and global surface oceans. Model predictions
and laboratory experiments indicate that as the pH of the oceans drops,
the ability of calcifying corals to build their carbonate skeletons will
be significantly reduced. Here, we investigate coral calcificat...
The quality of groundwater is threatened in karstic regions with very high population growth, such as the eastern coast of
Yucatan. As polluted groundwater flows towards the ocean, coastal ecosystems and coral reefs may also be affected. Pollution
and the interaction between the coastal aquifer and the reef lagoon were assessed at a developing area...
The Yucatan Peninsula karst aquifer is one of the most extensive and spectacular karst aquifer systems on the planet. This transboundary aquifer system extends over an area of approximately 165,000 km(2) in M,xico, Guatemala and Belize. The Triassic to Holocene Yucatan limestone platform is located in the vicinity of the North American/Caribbean pl...
Rising atmospheric CO2 and its equilibration with surface ocean seawater is lowering both the pH and carbonate saturation state (Ω) of the oceans.
Numerous calcifying organisms, including reef-building corals, may be severely impacted by declining aragonite and calcite
saturation, but the fate of coral reef ecosystems in response to ocean acidifica...
We report on the magnetostratigraphy of the Chicxulub crater impact breccias and first 15 meters of the Paleocene sedimentary sequence recovered in three boreholes of the UNAM Scientific Drilling Program. Three geomagnetic polarity zones are documented in the impact breccias and sedimentary sequence, which span from chron 29R to 28N. For the 15 m i...
Recent increases in atmospheric carbon dioxide have resulted in rising aqueous CO2 concentrations that lower the pH of the oceans (Caldeira and Wickett 2003, 2005, Doney et al., 2009). It is estimated that over the next 100 years, the pH of the surface oceans will decrease by ~0.4 pH units (Orr et al., 2005), which is expected to hinder the calcify...
A scientific drilling program is being carried out by the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM) at the southern sector of the Chicxulub impact crater in the Yucatan Peninsula, Mexico. Eight boreholes, ranging in depth from 60 m to 702 m, with a total of 2.62 km of continuos core, were recovered. A high recovery rate of up to 99% (overall...
The Yucatan Peninsula is one of the world’s largest karstic aquifer systems. It is the sole freshwater source for human users and ecosystems. The region hosts internationally important groundwater-dependent ecosystems (GDEs) in the 5280 km2 Sian Ka’an Biosphere Reserve. The GDEs are threatened by increasing groundwater abstractions and risks of pol...