Extraterrestrial Cause for the Cretaceous-Tertiary Extinction

The foundational paper proposing asteroid impact as the cause of the K-Pg extinction, based on anomalous iridium concentrations 600x above background levels at the Cretaceous-Paleogene boundary. One of the most influential papers in paleontology, it revolutionized understanding of extinction by demonstrating that external catastrophic events - not gradual competitive displacement - can eliminate even the most dominant lineages.

For business strategy, the Alvarez hypothesis illustrates that extinction can result from exogenous shocks entirely outside an organization's control or prediction. No amount of competitive fitness in pre-impact environments protected dinosaurs from the asteroid. Similarly, no amount of market dominance protects companies from regulatory asteroids, technological disruptions, or financial crises that fundamentally restructure competitive landscapes.