However, now it looks like the mass accumulation theory was right after all. But instead of a mechanism in which atoms of increasingly massive material have been added to our planet, I've found a mechanism in which the number of atoms remain the same. Each and every atom has increased in mass. Every proton and every neutrons has grown larger.
When conditions are right, protons and neutrons grow in size by absorbing electron-positron pairs. But positrons are in short supply. It would take forever to scrape together enough positrons to make the mass of our planet increase. Yet the increases in gravity are believed to have been quick when they happened. So quick that large animals were unable to adapt by growing smaller.
So what exactly is this mechanism that can change the mass of our planet so swiftly? Is it something new and exotic that no one ever heard of before, or can it be explained within the existing framework of physics?
As it turns out, it can in fact be explained without resorting to something completely new. The answer can be found in well established particle physics, proven in lab experiments.
The mechanism in question is called electron positron pair production. It happens when a high energy photon (gamma-ray) comes into a high voltage field. The photon spontaneously transforms itself into an electron positron pair.
Interestingly, the electric field close to the nucleus of an atom has the ideal condition for such pair production to happen. That means that the electron positron pair spontaneously appear just where we need them: in the immediate vicinity of the nucleus of atoms. Neutrons and protons hungry and ripe for expansion can gobble up the positron together with an electron before the positron has time to annihilate.
Given the right environment in which protons and neutrons are open for expansion, gamma-rays will produce the required building stones. A steady stream of cosmic radiation will result in a relatively smooth transition from one quantum state to another. A sudden burst of gamma-rays on the other hand could speed the process up to a catastrophic rate in which large land animals would have insufficient time to adapt.
As it happens, it appears that the extinction of the dinosaurs coincided with a series of nearby supernova events. These would have flooded our planet with gamma-rays. Every event would have come as a shock to the environment, killing off the largest dinosaurs due to a rapid increase in gravity and inertia.
Sea animals would not get away from the carnage either. Fishes with heavy bone structures would have experienced a change in their buoyancy. Unable to compensate for the change in buoyancy by swimming faster, they would soon find themselves helpless at the bottom of the sea. The ammonoids that dominated the oceans about 300 million years ago may well have met a similar fate.
Gamma-ray photon splitting into an electron-positron pair
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