Table 5.

Summary of the main findings provided by this literature review and some key English references supporting and/or contradicting each finding.

main finding	references	English literature supporting the finding	English literature contradicting the finding
potassium is the most toxic ion for freshwater fauna	[3,30,31,33]	[33]	Soucek et al. [39] found that Neocloeon triangulifer was relatively less sensitive to K salts
toxic effect of an ion can be compensated by other ions (antagonism)	[2,34,35]	[37–39]	—
historical salt exposure can enhance the salinity tolerance of freshwater fauna	[40,41]	[42–45]	[46,47,49]
salinization can cause massive fish kills, which are among the most salinity-sensitive freshwater organisms	[31,50,51,53]	—	—
salinization can cause massive algal blooms	[31,59]	—	—
extreme salinization can lead to an extensive depletion of aquatic fauna	[31,53]	[24]	—
salinization can promote biological invasions	[52,62]	[61]	[67]
salinization can cause delay and inhibition of organic matter degradation by bacteria	[68]	[69]	Canhoto et al. [70] showed that trade-offs between growth and sporulation can maintain fungal growth and decomposition at high levels along wide salinity gradients