1. tfk
  2. Friday Find: The Sahara fertilizes the Amazon

Friday Find: The Sahara fertilizes the Amazon

By tfk on January 5, 2007.

i-8a4572854ae8b9381b26bfd63e669f77-_images_1748-9326_1_1_014005_Full_2956401.jpg
NASA tells us Bodele Depression Dust Feeds Amazon:

By studying NASA satellite data of the spread of dust across the globe, scientists discovered that more than half of the mineral dust that fertilizes the Amazon soil comes from a single spot in the southern Sahara, a large mountain-rimmed valley called the Bodele Depression.

They have an image of the Bodélé there, and a link to the original research paper, "The Bodélé depression: a single spot in the Sahara that provides most of the mineral dust to the Amazon forest." As you can see from the image above, reproduced from that paper, there are a series of wind tunnels in the landscape of the Bodélé which channel wind, and those winds pick up dirt and carry it around the world to the Amazon, where it enriches the soil in one of the most diverse and productive regions on earth.

I'm carefully avoiding all references to Bob Dylan songs here.

Tags
Planet Earth

More like this

Older than Dirt?
Every once in awhile, a question makes it to my inbox that's too good to ignore. A friend and I were joking about being "older than dirt" and he asked a question I thought you might enjoy: "Hey, ask Ethan how old dirt is and how it got here." You did the smart thing by coming to me, because the…
The Time for Mars is Now
By Dr. Adrian Brown Planetary physicist at the Carl Sagan Center for the Study of Life in the Universe, SETI Institute, and Gail Jacobs When most people look at photos of the Martian landscape, they see the kind of dry topography that, while attractive, shows only that at first glance Mars…
Sand Seas of the Solar System
By Dr. Lori Fenton; Carl Sagan Center for the Study of Life in the Universe, SETI Institute, and Gail Jacobs Planetary scientist Dr. Lori Fenton joined the SETI Institute's Carl Sagan Center as a Principal Investigator in 2006, and was awarded NASA's Carl Sagan Fellowship for Early Career…
There's Global Warming on Mars Too
This is just one of dozens of responses to common climate change denial arguments, which can all be found at How to Talk to a Climate Sceptic. Objection: Global warming is happening on Mars and Pluto as well. Since there are no SUV's on Mars, CO2 can't be causing Global Warming. Answer: Warming…

Wow. Cool science.

Yeah! Science for once.

Instead of the usual hate fundies and relgion in general rants.

I always wondered why they let Josh get away with calling this a science blog.
depp=true

I always wondered why they let Josh get away with calling this a science blog.

Probably for a better reason than bozo politicians trying to decide science by fiat.