'Great Dying' changed marine life forever

[Dann Pigdon <dannj@alphalink.com.au>]

About 95% of the Earth's marine species and 70% of its land species were 
wiped out during a mass extinction about 250 million years ago, according to 
Australian and US researchers. 

... scientists at James Cook University in Townsville, Queensland and the 
Field Museum in Chicago... report in today's issue of the journal Science 
how they came across the culling of species while examining figures on the 
numbers of marine life forms in communities over the past 540 million years. 

Simple species that did not move or search for food were largely wiped out, 
they conclude. 

More complex life forms such as crabs and snails that went looking for food 
took over. 

The researchers did not go into what caused the mass extinction. 

But using a new palaeobiology database, they gave what they say are the most 
exhaustive details ever assembled of its effect... 


Read more at: 

http://www.abc.net.au/science/news/stories/2006/1796479.htm 

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Dann Pigdon
GIS / Archaeologist         http://www.geocities.com/dannsdinosaurs
Melbourne, Australia        http://heretichides.soffiles.com
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