The Impact Cratering Record of the Canadian North

撞击坑是太阳系中普遍存在的基本地质过程。它被认为是月球、水星、小行星以及火星和金星等大部分地质活动更活跃的行星上最重要的表面过程。我们现在知道，陨石撞击事件在整个地球历史上也发挥了重要作用，塑造了地质景观，影响了生命的进化，并产生了具有重大经济意义的矿物和碳氢化合物矿床。这项研究计划的结果将填补当前知识中的一些重大空白，并将进一步加深我们对陨石撞击事件及其有益的科学和经济影响的理解。这对加拿大来说尤其重要，因为加拿大从萨德伯里冲击构造内的采矿中获得了如此巨大的财富——萨德伯里是北美最富有的矿区。该研究计划的长期目标是验证陨石撞击坑能够产生有益影响的假设，例如为微生物群落提供新的栖息地，产生经济矿物和碳氢化合物矿床，以及在陨石坑内湖泊沉积物中详细的古环境记录。本文主要对不同类型目标岩石和不同保存状态下直径20 ~ 40 km的撞击坑进行了对比研究。这将使我们能够区分特定陨石坑的局部影响和特征与撞击陨石坑的更一般特征。未来5年将对以下5个地点进行调查：Haughton撞击结构，Nunavut, 75°22' N, 89°41' N；Mistastin撞击构造，拉布拉多，北纬55°53′，西经63°18′；阿尔伯特亲王撞击结构，NWT, 72°30' N, 114°0'W；Clearwater East和Clearwater West撞击构造，魁北克，56°05′N， 74°07′W和56°13′N， 74°30′W。

Impact cratering is a fundamental and ubiquitous geological process in the Solar System. It is considered the most important surface process on the Moon, Mercury, asteroids, and over large parts of the more geologically active planets of Mars and Venus. We now know that meteorite impact events have also played an important role throughout Earth's history, shaping the geological landscape, affecting the evolution of life, and producing mineral and hydrocarbon deposits of major economic significance. The results of this research program will fill in some significant gaps in current knowledge and will further our understanding of meteorite impact events and their beneficial scientific and economic effects. This is particularly important for Canada, which draws such a huge amount of wealth from the mining within the Sudbury impact structure - the richest mining district in North America. The long-term objectives of this research program is to test the hypotheses that meteorite impact craters can produce beneficial effects, such as providing new habitats for microbial communities, the generation of economic mineral and hydrocarbon deposits, and detailed paleoenvironmental records in intra-crater lake deposits. This work focuses on comparative study of impact craters ~20-40 km in diameter within different types of target rocks and in different states of preservation. This will enable the differentiation of local effects and features of specific craters from more general features of impact craters. The following 5 sites will be investigated over the course of the next 5 years: Haughton impact structure, Nunavut, 75° 22' N, 89° 41' N; Mistastin impact structure, Labrador, 55° 53' N, 63° 18' W; Prince Albert impact structure, NWT, 72° 30' N, 114° 0'W; Clearwater East and Clearwater West impact structures, Quebec, 56° 05' N, 74° 07' W and 56° 13' N, 74° 30' W, respectively.