Did Volcanoes Drive Dinos to Extinction?

Colossal, repeated volcanic eruptions in India 65 million years ago released sulfuric gases that sent the dinosaurs, well, the way of the dinosaurs, reports the San Francisco Chronicle. A group of scientists at a Bay Area conference this week is questioning the decades-held theory that a meteor killed off dinosaurs. Crater theory proponents, meanwhile, say the Deccan volcanoes may have had an "interesting contributory role," but weren't the prime cause of extinction.

Lava-covered dinosaur eggs in the Deccan area boost the new theory being considered by the 14,000-scientist gathering. The greenhouse extinction possibility has been been "vastly underestimated" and the crater theory hastily accepted, the lead author says. She age-dated minerals presumably from the Chicxulub crater that suggest the meteorite hit 300,000 years before dinosaurs died off.
(More science stories.)