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In 10,000 years, the post-glacial rebound of the Baltic Sea will have reduced the depth by about 90 m (300 ft). The Hudson Bay will decrease in depth by 100 m over the same period. [38] After 100,000 years, the island of Hawaii will have shifted about 9 km (5.6 mi) to the northwest. The planet may be entering another glacial period by this time.
The small red dwarf Ross 248 will pass within 3.024 light-years of Earth, becoming the closest star to the Sun. [31] It will recede after about 8,000 years, making first Alpha Centauri (again) and then Gliese 445 the nearest stars [31] (see timeline). 50,000
Earth formed in this manner about 4.54 billion years ago (with an uncertainty of 1%) [25] [26] [4] and was largely completed within 10–20 million years. [27] In June 2023, scientists reported evidence that the planet Earth may have formed in just three million years, much faster than the 10−100 million years thought earlier.
In 1862, the physicist William Thomson, 1st Baron Kelvin published calculations that fixed the age of Earth at between 20 million and 400 million years. [19] [20] He assumed that Earth had formed as a completely molten object, and determined the amount of time it would take for the near-surface temperature gradient to decrease to its present value.
The first known mass extinction was the Great Oxidation Event 2.4 billion years ago, which killed most of the planet's obligate anaerobes. Researchers have identified five other major extinction events in Earth's history, with estimated losses below: [11] End Ordovician: 440 million years ago, 86% of all species lost, including graptolites
The asteroid that slammed into Earth 66 million years ago and led to the extinction of dinosaurs was estimated to be about 6.2 miles (10 kilometers) in diameter and marked the last known large ...
500 million years of climate change Ice core data for the past 400,000 years, with the present at right. Note length of glacial cycles averages ~100,000 years. Blue curve is temperature, green curve is CO 2, and red curve is windblown glacial dust (loess). Scale: Millions of years before present, earlier dates approximate.
The table starts counting approximately 10,000 years before present, or around 8,000 BC, during the middle Greenlandian, about 1,700 years after the end of the Younger Dryas and 1,800 years before the 8.2-kiloyear event. From the beginning of the early modern period until the 20th century, world population has been characterized by a rapid growth.