Geophysical Mapping of an Impact Crater in Northeastern Brazil: Serra da Cangalha Impact Crater

Interest in studying impact processes on earth has increased tremendously because it has been recognized that these processes are important geologic events. Besides, the evolution of life on Earth has been severely affected by the impact of large extraterrestrial projectiles (asteroids and comets). The earth and its inhabitants are in perenial danger of earth-crossing objects (ECO) impacting on the Earth. These objects race through space at velocities relative to the earth of up to 75 times the speed of sound. These extraterrestrial objects are materials left over from the formation of the solar system and are basically material that never coalesced into planets The book deals with quantitative characterization of the Serra da Cangalha impact crater using integrated MT (2-D and 3-D modeling) and aeromagnetic data sets to provide new insight into the kinematics subsurface structure beneath the impact crater and obtain glean of the basement structures that exist in the subsurface. Using, well established empirical relations, the resultant environmental perturbations that occurred in the region were evaluated and discussed in this book.