* Astronomy

Scientists have singled out mercury as one of the major factors behind the earth's greatest extinction 250 million years ago, obliterating most marine and land species.
During the late Permian, the natural buffering system in the ocean became overloaded with mercury contributing to the loss of 95 percent of life in the sea.
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Catastrophe - Ep3: Planet of Fire 1

Catastrophe - Ep3: Planet of Fire 2

Catastrophe - Ep3: Planet of Fire 3

Catastrophe - Ep3: Planet of Fire 4

250 million years ago, 95% of life was wiped off the face of Earth in the biggest extinction event ever. But what was responsible? Back then, our planet was a very different place. Millions of years before the era of dinosaurs, creatures such as dicynodonts and gorgonopsians roamed the land, while the oceans too teemed with life. Then, in the blink of a geological eye, everything changed. Life itself was almost completely wiped out in what is known as the Permian extinction. 

Travelling to locations such as South Africa, California, and Iceland, the experts discover that the volcanic activity of the Siberian Traps led to the release of deadly gases from beneath the sea and rises in Earth's temperature. This turbocharged global warming brought drought and a breakdown in the food cycle, with even the strongest animals eventually succumbing to the conditions.

The greatest mass extinction of all time? It wasn't as bad as first thought

The world's biodiversity was ravaged and studies had claimed it took land species as much as 15 to 30 million years to fully recover.
Yet when scientists examined sets of before and after fossils from north-eastern Arizona they found little difference in the genetic diversity.
The research, from the University of Rhode Island, now suggests life on Earth above water recovered in around five million years.
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Fungi helped destroy forests during mass extinction 250 million years ago

The demise of the world's forests some 250 million years ago likely was accelerated by aggressive tree-killing fungi triggered by global climate change, according to a new study by a University of California, Berkeley, scientist and her Dutch and British colleagues.
The researchers do not rule out the possibility that today's changing climate could cause a similar increase in pathogenic soil bacteria that could devastate forests already stressed by a warming climate and pollution.
The study, available online today (Aug. 5), will be published in the September 2011 print edition of the journal Geology of the Geological Society of America.
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