A screenshot of the ImpactEarth website. Click on the picture for a larger version.

The destruction of the Earth by an asteroid is among our favorite horror stories.

But what would really happen if an asteroid hit the Earth?

Jay Melosh and Robert Marcus of the University of Arizona, and Gareth Collins of Imperial College London created a web-based program to estimate the consequences of a comet or asteroid impact.

A basic version was created in 2005, but the version recently created by Purdue is much more attractive - and fun to use. Check it out at this week's featured link!

-Miriam Boon, iSGTW