Occurrence of natural fullerene C60 from the iridium-rich Cretaceous-Paleogene (K-Pg) boundary layers of the Um-Sohryngkew river section, Meghalaya, India

A marine section from Um Sohryngkew riverbasin, in Meghalaya,  have been studied for serach of fullerenes and associated carbon polymorphs .  This section is known for Ir-enrichment with an order of magnitude enhancement of Ir and Os, accompanied by unambiguous extinction of planktonic foraminifera, is found in a cm thicklimonitic clay layer in this section..Peak iridium concentration is found to be 13 ng/g. Os/Ir andNi/Ir are estimated to be 0.37 and 196000 respectively.  We reported here the first observation of C60 fullerenes and nano-diamonds in in the iridium-rich Cretaceous-Palaeogene (K-Pg) boundary layer from the Um-Sohryngkew river section of Meghalaya.