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The Saharan Desert

Published by balisunset in Science
July 20, 2008

Always known as the a largest desert on Earth, it has a fascinating history of over hundreds of million of years.

The climate of the Sahara has altered climate during the prehistoric times:

  • In the oasis of Bilma (Niger), there were craters with saline deposits, which are the remains of seas that covered the Sahara 100 million years ago
  • 40 000 years ago, there were large lakes in the Sahara, populated semi-nomadic people
  • 18 000 years ago, the Sahara was lush with jungle and vegetation
  • Around 12,000 years before our time, its south-eastern boundary was close to the Tropic of Cancer
  • Around 10,500 years before our time, the desert surface was less than half the current
  • The further change in climate of this eco-region is continued to be changed around 8,500 years before our time. The Sahara was wet and covered steppe and savannah.
  • Although the warming was rapidly increasing, the Sahara was still wet to 6,500 years before our time
  • The Sahara became arid, 3000 years ago. Before that, it was grassland and had rich fauna.

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