How to Use impactor in a Sentence
impactor
noun-
Spring: Roads are a key impactor for wildlife around the world.
—Chris Klimek, Smithsonian Magazine, 21 Dec. 2023
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As for who’s right about the true origin of the Chicxulub impactor?
—Bruce Dorminey, Forbes, 28 Feb. 2021
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Instead, the mass could come from an ancient impactor, the team argues.
—National Geographic, 11 June 2019
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With that in mind, the researchers calculated an estimate of the size of the impactor.
—Scott K. Johnson, Ars Technica, 18 Nov. 2018
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For decades, scientists have searched for the elusive resting place of the impactor that coated the Earth with debris.
—Leslie Nemo, Discover Magazine, 3 Jan. 2020
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After the large impactor smashed into the planet, some of the debris formed a disk that flew up to circle the Martian equator.
—Nola Taylor Redd, Space.com, 18 Apr. 2018
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As for how this years-long process of impactor detective work got started?
—Bruce Dorminey, Forbes, 8 Oct. 2022
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Scientists have suggested that the impactor was about 10 percent of the mass of Earth — just larger than Mars.
—Fox News, 16 Mar. 2020
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Can anything yet be determined about the original size of the impactor?
—Bruce Dorminey, Forbes, 8 Oct. 2022
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The crater wasn't as obvious as expected, but is about the right size given the impactor speed, mass, and angle of impact.
—Phil Plait, Discover Magazine, 16 Feb. 2011
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Within moments the six-mile-wide chunk of rock, known as the Chicxulub impactor, caused tsunamis so large that the Great Plains were overwhelmed with water.
—Sara Novak, Discover Magazine, 2 June 2023
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So even though the impactor loses its water, some of it is recaptured as the melt rapidly quenches.
—Jay Bennett, Popular Mechanics, 26 Apr. 2018
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The walls of the crater indicate that the impactor arrived at a considerable angle.
—John Timmer, Ars Technica, 27 Oct. 2022
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That’s quite a lot, considering the impactor itself was only half a ton.
—Ramin Skibba, WIRED, 30 Aug. 2023
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For one thing, Deep Impact was an all-in-one mission, with an observer and impactor on board one spacecraft.
—Phil Plait, Discover Magazine, 6 Mar. 2012
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The theory invoked an impactor the size of Mars or—in recent variants—much smaller.
—Paul Voosen, Science | AAAS, 23 Mar. 2021
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This consisted of a lunar orbiter and an impactor that helped confirm the existence of water ice on the Moon.
—Eric Berger, Ars Technica, 22 July 2019
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These rocks were exiled from Mars after impactors struck the planet’s surface and kicked debris into space.
—Shi En Kim, Smithsonian Magazine, 18 Oct. 2023
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While 30% to 50% of the rock struck by the Chicxulub impactor was made up of evaporite deposits like salt and gypsum, almost none of that material is found in the core.
—Scott K. Johnson, Ars Technica, 15 Sep. 2019
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This impact occurred just under 66 million years ago by an impactor that may have been up to 80 kilometers across!
—Erik Klemetti, Discover Magazine, 1 May 2019
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The goal of the test was to see how well a kinetic impactor would work at changing an asteroid’s orbit and trajectory.
—Joshua Hawkins, BGR, 27 Sep. 2022
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The energy that must have been deposited by an impactor to cause the formation of Chicxulub crater.
—Ethan Siegel, Forbes, 18 May 2021
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And, in the process, the articles indicate that impactors like DART could be a viable means of protecting the planet from small asteroids.
—John Timmer, Ars Technica, 1 Mar. 2023
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Barely a month later, an impactor spacecraft named Dart will give chase to a double-asteroid closer to home.
—NBC News, 15 Oct. 2021
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This wide age range fertilized speculations that the Boltysh impactor, beating Chicxulub’s to Earth by a hair, acted as the first of a one-two punch that wiped out the dinosaurs.
—She En Kim, Smithsonian Magazine, 18 June 2021
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Yet the chaotic period of impacts predicted in the Nice model provides a source of impactors during the exact era in question.
—Erica Jawin, Scientific American, 2 July 2019
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In short-warning scenarios, kinetic impactors like DART would not be enough.
—NBC News, 6 Apr. 2018
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The impact also left behind a thin layer of chromium-rich dust which suggested the impactor must have been a carbonaceous chondrite rock type.
—The Physics Arxiv Blog, Discover Magazine, 4 Mar. 2021
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The results surprised the scientists, because adding the flexible springs to the impactor did not always soften the impact compared to a fully rigid impactor.
—Jennifer Ouellette, Ars Technica, 6 Nov. 2023
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The impactors—six-foot-long, six-inch-thick rods filled with explosives—would smash into the asteroid like buckshot, efficiently dismantling it.
—Popular Science, 1 Nov. 2023
Some of these examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'impactor.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.
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