Institute of Computational Mathematics and Mathematical Geophysics SB RAS
Tsunami Laboratory, Novosibirsk, Russia

Web Encyclopedia on Natural Hazards

An Expert Database on the Earth Impact Structures (EDEIS) has been compiled and is being maintained in the Tsunami Laboratory of the Institute of Computational Mathematics and Mathematical Geophysics of SD RAS in Novosibirsk. The main difference of this database from the well-known Earth Impact Database maintained by the Planetary and Space Science Centre, University of New Brunswick, Canada is that in addition to fully validated craters it contains also the data on the proposed structures whose impact origin is still needed to be confirmed. For any structure, the degree of confidence of impact origin is reflected by its validity index V, which varies from 4 (confirmed) to 0 (rejected) with intermediate values of 3 (probable), 2 (perspective) and 1 (proposed for further study). Classification of structures over the validity index is based on some sort of expert judgment and reflects the availability of impact criteria found at four different levels � morphological, geological, petrological and mineralogical. Currently, the database contains 1168 structures, among them 221 structures with V=4; 198 structures with V=3; 509 structures with V=2; 113 structures with V=1
The database also includes 127 rejected structures, whose once proposed impact origin was later disproven by additional studies. In addition to the main parametric table, the database contains over 4050 photos and maps, 976 textual descriptions and 1781 bibliographical references.

Spatial distribution of the impact structures with validity index V=1-4 included in the EDEIS.
Size of circles is proportional to the crater diameter, color corresponds to four groups of age.

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