Photo: Comet Wiped Out Early North American Culture, Animals, Study Says

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Comet Hale-Bopp as seen as it passed over Mexico in 1997. A new study suggests that the impact of a comet some 13,000 years ago may have caused the extinction of ancient mammals and brought about the demise of one of North America's earliest cultures.

Photograph by Jose Fernando Barral Caballero, courtesy NASA/JPL

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