THE DAWNING OF THE AGE OF PLUTONIUM

Scientists are about to declare a new geological time period: the Age of Plutonium.

Or to be more accurate, the Anthropocine Era. The date they have chosen coincides with the appearance of plutonium, a man-made radioactive element, on the earth.

And although they haven't named the exact date yet, the odds-on favourite for this dubious distinction is July 16, 1945...the date of the first atomic bomb blast, codenamed Trinity, at Alamogordo in New Mexico

Hioroshima and Nagasaki quickly followed and then for decades the great powers, including Britain, detonated huge numbers of nuclear weapons as they perfected their death-dealing armories.

The tests, in remote areas, sent enormous plumes of radiation into the atmosphere showering down microcopic particles of plutonium until today there is not a corner of the planet that isn't polluted by this deadliest of substances

Now, because plutonium is man-made, scientists have been able to pronounce our era of existence the Anthropocene, or 'The Time of Humans ' The Anthropocine Working Group (AWG) say the start date for this era is the 1950s which they say is a time in Earth's history when human activity began to influence every facet of our lives.

Scientists from Brock University in Canada have identified a surge in human activity resulting in radioactive dust, plastic and other harmful substances after examining mud deposits in Crawford Lake, Canada

Professor Francine McCarthy, a micropaleontologist, said Crawford Lake was chosen as scientists found markers in the lake bed mud after boreholes were cut. These showed changes caused by humans to the planet's climate and chemistry spelling the start of the Anthropocine

Professor Andrew Cundy, an expert in environmental radiochemistry at Southampton University said the detonation of the Trinity device on July 16, 1945 arguably marked the start of this new age.

He said: "Subsequent nuclear detonations, as part of the Cold War arms race, globally distributed a suite of radioactive fallout products which have been captured in the Earth’s sediments, soils, ice, and biological constructions such as corals, trees, and skeletons.

"This process has fingerprinted the mid-twentieth century and provides a global, almost synchronous marker in the Earth’s geological materials."

He revealed: "The long half-lives of a number of these fallout products will allow their detection well into our planet’s future, and they provide a clear radiometric marker that coincides with the proposed start of the Great Acceleration, and the Anthropocene "

Prof Cundy said that later atomic detonations used more powerful (higher yield) fission-fusion or fission-fusion-fission devices H-bombs which used a fission explosion to produce the intense pressures and temperatures required to fuse hydrogen nuclei in a fusion reaction

This fusion reaction is capable of releasing vastly more energy (and explosive power) than the equivalent fission reaction, and importantly, atmospheric detonation of these more powerful devices is capable of blasting radioactive and irradiated material high into the atmosphere, from where it can be hemispherically or globally distributed before returning to the earth

The Anthropocine Era will be officially announced probably later this year after more investigations.