The largest mass extinction in the history of the earth could have been triggered off by giant salt lakes, whose emissions of halogenated gases changed the atmospheric composition so dramatically that vegetation was irretrievably damaged. At least that is what an international team of scientists have reported in the most recent edition of the "Proceedings of the Russian Academy of Sciences" (Dokladi Earth Sciences). At the Permian/Triassic boundary, 250 million years ago about 90 percent of the animal and plant species ashore became extinct.

"Using steppe plant species we were able to prove that halogenated gases contribute to speeding up desertification: The combination of stress induced by dryness and the simultaneous chemical stressor "halogenated hydrocarbons" disproportionately damages and destabilize the plants and speeds up the process of erosion," Dr. Karsten Kotte from the University of Heidelberg explained.

Based on both of these findings the researchers were able to form their new hypothesis: At the end of the Permian Age the emissions of halogenated gases from the Zechstein Sea and other salt seas were responsible in a complex chain of events for the world's largest mass extinction in the history of the earth, in which about 90 percent of the animal and plant species of that time became extinct.

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Although it's replete with the latest IPCC climate hysteria implying doom from the modest rise in CO2, it seems to be an interesting and falsifyable theory. Ancient riverbeds from the end of the Permian were straight vs the meandering rivers in non desert present day Earth, indicating that the vegetation normally occuring in verdant areas was missing. I for one am glad the Permian is over because really big carniverous lizards with sails on their backs would make backwoods hiking and camping hell.