Toba catastrophe theory
Supereruption 75,000 years ago that may have caused a global volcanic winter / From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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The Youngest Toba eruption was a supervolcano eruption that occurred around 74,000 years ago[1] at the site of present-day Lake Toba in Sumatra, Indonesia. It is one of the Earth's largest known explosive eruptions. The Toba catastrophe theory holds that this event caused a severe global volcanic winter of six to ten years and contributed to a 1,000-year-long cooling episode, leading to a genetic bottleneck in humans.[2][3]
| Youngest Toba eruption | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Volcano | Toba Caldera Complex |
| Date | c. 74,000 years BP |
| End time | 9-14 days |
| Type | Ultra-Plinian |
| Location | Sumatra, Indonesia 2.6845°N 98.8756°E |
| VEI | 8 |
| Impact | Second-most recent super-eruption; impact disputed |
| Deaths | (Potentially) Almost all of humanity, leaving around 3,000 - 10,000 humans left on the planet |
 Lake Toba is the resulting crater lake | |
A number of genetic studies revealed that 50,000 years ago human ancestor population greatly expanded from only a few thousand individuals.[4][5] Science journalist Ann Gibbons posited that the low population size was caused by the Youngest Toba eruption.[6] Geologist Michael R. Rampino of New York University and volcanologist Stephen Self of the University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa supported her suggestion.[7] In 1998, the bottleneck theory was further developed by anthropologist Stanley H. Ambrose of the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign.[2] However, physical evidence refutes the links with millennium-long cold event and genetic bottleneck, and some consider the theory disproven.[8][9][10][11][12]