{"id":92307,"date":"2025-10-31T18:57:57","date_gmt":"2025-10-31T18:57:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/all-news\/researchers-discover-first-possible-mountaintop-crater-2"},"modified":"2025-10-31T19:29:05","modified_gmt":"2025-10-31T19:29:05","slug":"researchers-discover-first-possible-mountaintop-crater-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/all-news\/researchers-discover-first-possible-mountaintop-crater-2","title":{"rendered":"Researchers Discover First Possible Mountaintop Crater"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span style=\"color: #ff6600\"><strong>Africa-Press &#8211; South-Africa. <\/strong><\/span>Researchers have speculated that the meteorite at the center of the creation of China\u2019s Front and Rear Baijifeng peaks dates back to the Jurassic Period, according to findings.<\/p>\n<p>Two mountain peaks in China \u2013 Front Baijifeng and Rear Baijifeng \u2013 were found to have essentially been created by the impact of a meteorite which fell from the sky hundreds of millions of years ago, making it the first confirmed mountaintop crater.<\/p>\n<p>Researchers at the Center for High Pressure Science and Technology Advanced Research in Shanghai \u201cset out to find\u201d the origin story of rocks known as \u201ccelestial stones\u201d at the Baijifeng Mountain, located in northeastern China, not far from the North Korean border.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe set out to find out the real story behind this accumulation of rock fragments\u201d, the team, led by researchers Ming Chen and Ho-Kwang Mao, wrote. \u201cOur investigation has revealed for the first time the presence of an impact structure on Baijifeng Mountain.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>After examining the rock fragments they found their make-up to consist of sandstone and granite, both of which contain small quartz minerals. The authors then found specific deformations usually caused by heat and pressure.<\/p>\n<p>The deformations are \u201cwidely accepted as diagnostic evidence for shock metamorphism and terrestrial impact structures,\u201d the authors write. As such, it indicates they came from a meteorite impact site which spans about 4,600 feet (1,400 meters) and formed the two peaks known as Front Baijifeng and Rear Baijifeng.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cDuring the impact cratering,\u201d the researchers write, \u201ca large amount of rock would have been excavated and ejected to form this new geological structure. The collision would have greatly changed the original terrain of the target, forming two new peaks, namely, Front Baijifeng and Rear Baijifeng.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The researchers are unsure of when the crater was actually formed, but believe the meteorite could have hit the mountain after the Jurassic Period\u2014between 150 million and 172 million years ago. But in any case, they will have to do further tests to confirm whether a meteorite really was responsible for changing the shape of the mountain.<\/p>\n<p><strong>For More News And Analysis About <span style=\"color: #ff6600\">South-Africa<\/span> Follow <span style=\"color: #ff6600\">Africa-Press<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Africa-Press &#8211; South-Africa. Researchers have speculated that the meteorite at the center of the creation of China\u2019s Front and Rear Baijifeng peaks dates back to the Jurassic Period, according to findings. Two mountain peaks in China \u2013 Front Baijifeng and Rear Baijifeng \u2013 were found to have essentially been created by the impact of a [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":84,"featured_media":92306,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2,9],"tags":[275],"class_list":["post-92307","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-all-news","category-miscellaneous","tag-south-africa-2"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v26.1 (Yoast SEO v27.0) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-premium-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Researchers Discover First Possible Mountaintop Crater - South Africa<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Researchers have speculated that the meteorite at the center of the creation of China\u2019s Front and Rear Baijifeng peaks d ...\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/all-news\/researchers-discover-first-possible-mountaintop-crater-2\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Researchers Discover First Possible Mountaintop Crater\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Researchers have speculated that the meteorite at the center of the creation of China\u2019s Front and Rear Baijifeng peaks d ...\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/all-news\/researchers-discover-first-possible-mountaintop-crater-2\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"South Africa\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/AfricaPressTunisiaa\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2025-10-31T18:57:57+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2025-10-31T19:29:05+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/static.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/sites\/31\/2025\/10\/sm_1761926302.484622.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"1199\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"791\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"cfeditoren\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"cfeditoren\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/all-news\/researchers-discover-first-possible-mountaintop-crater-2#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/all-news\/researchers-discover-first-possible-mountaintop-crater-2\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"cfeditoren\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/#\/schema\/person\/068c7ab4e9634ae78ec5d54ec46598bb\"},\"headline\":\"Researchers Discover First Possible Mountaintop Crater\",\"datePublished\":\"2025-10-31T18:57:57+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2025-10-31T19:29:05+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/all-news\/researchers-discover-first-possible-mountaintop-crater-2\"},\"wordCount\":355,\"commentCount\":0,\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/all-news\/researchers-discover-first-possible-mountaintop-crater-2#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/static.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/sites\/31\/2025\/10\/sm_1761926302.484622.jpg\",\"keywords\":[\"South-Africa\"],\"articleSection\":[\"all news\",\"miscellaneous\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/all-news\/researchers-discover-first-possible-mountaintop-crater-2#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/all-news\/researchers-discover-first-possible-mountaintop-crater-2\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/south-africa\/all-news\/researchers-discover-first-possible-mountaintop-crater-2\",\"name\":\"Researchers Discover First Possible Mountaintop Crater - 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