The Atacama Desert in northern Chile sits in the rain shadow of the Andes Mountains. Though it borders the Pacific Ocean, a persistent cold flow known as the Humboldt Current keeps moisture levels in ...

Flamingos feed in Laguna Chaxa, a salt-rich lagoon in Chile’s Atacama Desert. It’s a location that flamingos have adapted to live in over millennia. But each year, is still a struggle. November 2024.

The Atacama Desert is one of the most extreme habitats on Earth. Atacama surface soil samples include a mix of DNA from inside and outside living cells. A new technique allows researchers to separate ...

When we say a place is “driest,” we generally mean it receives very little precipitation (rain or snow), often much less than ...

Nestled between the Andes Mountains and the Pacific Ocean, the Atacama Desert has earned the title of the driest place on Earth. The desert only sees rain a few times per century, or in some reaches ...

The Atacama Desert of Chile is largely considered the driest place on Earth, but recently saw the moon-like landscape blanketed in snow. Jared Verdi via Unsplash Nestled between the Andes Mountains ...

On June 25, 2025, an extraordinary sight unfolded over the Atacama Desert, the driest place on Earth. A rare snowfall blanketed the region, an event so rare that meteorologists confirmed it was the ...

This recently-released image from NASA gives a mesmerizing, bird’s eye view of an unusual event in what’s widely considered the driest non-polar place on Earth – the Atacama Desert. The satellite ...

The driest place on Earth just had its wettest November on record.

Sand dunes in Death Valley National Park. There are few national parks as extreme as Death Valley National Park, which straddles the border of California and Nevada. The saltwater flats of Badwater ...