Methane-Producing Bacteria May Have Caused Earth’s Largest Mass Extinction

Scientists have identified five mass extinctions over the course of the Earth’s history. While many are familiar with the cataclysmic event that wiped out the dinosaurs 65 million years ago, the most dramatic die-off happened during the Permian 252 million years ago. According to research from MIT , a microbe named Methanosarcina may have been responsible for the demise of 90 percent of marine species and 70 percent of land vertebrates. The tiny organisms multiplied in such numbers that they were able to bombard the atmosphere with methane , causing the oceans to acidify and turn the climate into a hostile environment for life. Read the rest of Methane-Producing Bacteria May Have Caused Earth’s Largest Mass Extinction Permalink | Add to del.icio.us | digg Post tags: archaea , Biodiversity , CO2 , Dinosaur , global warming , greenhouse gas , greg fournier , mass extinction , methane , methanosarcina , microbes , microorganisms , MIT , ocean acidification , permian , siberia , volcanic activity        

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Methane-Producing Bacteria May Have Caused Earth’s Largest Mass Extinction