10 least studied places on earth
Most people tend to think that if modern technologies allowed us to start exploring the Moon and Mars, send spacecraft to Jupiter, Saturn and other planets, then there is nothing special on Earth to study. In fact this is not true. Today there are quite a few areas on the globe that remain for some reason poorly understood.
Namibia is one of the most sparsely populated countries in the world (only 2.3 million people live on an area of 824 thousand square kilometers). It is located in the south of the African continent and got its name from the Namib Desert, which is home to a quarter of all cheetahs in the world (there are about 2.5 thousand). The desert land is known for its giant dunes, ancient rock paintings, meteor craters and waterfalls, and the landscape of Namibia is one of the most untouched in Africa. This place is an ideal haven for poachers, so the country's constitution spells out a program to protect a unique nature reserve, which includes many thousands of kilometers of uncharted desert (including the famous Kalahari).
Greenland has the second largest ice sheet of the world (after the Antarctic), and the island is used as a testing ground for basic research of glaciers: glaciologists here are studying the dynamics of the glacier, microbiologists - ancient life bound in ice. However, the most significant aspect remains the study of the paleoclimatic aspects of research, since ice has air inclusions that can provide information about the atmosphere of the past. Altogether, six deep wells have been drilled in Greenland, and the least studied area is the northern edge of Greenland, the Lincoln Sea and other ice surrounding it. Throughout their history, a few ships have been here, among them were our nuclear-powered icebreakers. But all this ice desert is gradually melting, and with the current pace, the shield will disappear after 2 thousand years.
Tristan da Cunha is an archipelago of four islands in the southern Atlantic Ocean, part of the British Overseas Territory of St. Helena. Along with Easter Island and the Pitcairn Islands is one of the most remote inhabited places on Earth. To the nearest coast of the mainland - that is, to South Africa - to sail 2,816 kilometers, and to South America - as many as 3,360 kilometers. There are no mammals on the islands (with the exception of seals on the shore and mice introduced by humans), reptiles, butterflies, but many endemic plants. The main property of the island - the smallest flightless bird on Earth - the shepherd boy of the Island Unapproachable, or Tristan cowgirl. According to the 2008 census, the population of the largest island of Tristan da Cunha is 264 people. Three other islands - Gough, Nightingale and Impregnable - are nature reserves.
Almost all the bottom of the oceans can be called the most unexplored space on our planet. However, the most mysterious known point is the oceanic deep-water channel in the west of the Pacific Ocean. The trench is named after the nearby Mariana Islands, and its deepest point, the "Challenger Abyss", is located in the southwestern part. According to measurements of 2011, its depth is 10,994 ± 40 meters below sea level. Only three people visited this place: Jacques Picard and Donald Walsh on the 1960 Trieste bathyscaphe and James Cameron on the Deepsea Challenger bathyscaphe in 2012. The pressure at such a depth is 1 106 times the pressure at sea level, but 20 thousand microorganisms were found at the bottom of the Challenger Void. Among the collected fauna were isopods and six species of shrimp-shaped amphipods. Further study of the depression, according to scientists, can tell us more about the adaptation of organisms to high pressure and, perhaps, even uncover the mystery of the origin of life.
The continent of Antarctica, covered with a thick layer of ice, is also one of the least studied parts of our planet. Research is hindered by the harsh climate, but in the future with warming, its development is quite possible. In Antarctica and on the adjacent islands, there are many abandoned settlements, military and whaling bases. Currently, there is no resident population in Antarctica, but there are about 45 year-round research stations where, depending on the season, from 1 thousand people live in winter and up to 4 thousand people in summer. The study of the ice sheet, in which data on the climate and atmospheric composition have been recorded for hundreds of thousands of years, sheds light on the past and the future of the Earth. The most unexplored section of the continent adjoins the Weddell Sea (West Antarctica). Recently it turned out that there is a swimming pool in the size of a small European country (about 20 thousand square kilometers), and its depth in some places is up to two kilometers.
Gangkhar Puenzum is the highest of the unconquered peaks of the world. The mountain is located in a disputed area between Bhutan and China and reaches a height of 7,570 meters. The mountain was first described in 1922, but the first attempts to conquer it began only after 1983, when mountaineering was allowed in Bhutan. In 1985 and 1986, four unsuccessful attempts were made, but in 1994 Bhutan again banned climbing mountains with a height of more than 6,000 meters out of respect for the local faith, and in 2003 mountaineering was completely banned. The Japanese expedition of 1998 decided to climb to the top from the Chinese side, but in the end, the climbers could only climb the neighboring Liangang-Kangri.
Every day, the Amazon forest area is dramatically decreasing. But, despite the logging, there are still untouched areas where no human foot has gone and the flora and fauna in its original form have been preserved. In Amazonia today there are tribes untouched by modern civilization. Rainforests are located on a vast plain covering almost the entire Amazon basin. This jungle is half of the remaining rainforests in the world. It is difficult to investigate them - primarily because of the densest undergrowth and a variety of dangerous animals. Jaguars, caimans, anacondas, poisonous spiders, parasites and vectors of infectious diseases live here, and electric stingrays, piranhas, and Kaners live in local rivers.
It is difficult to say how well explored the northern region of the Colombian Andes. This area is known for hiding criminals of all stripes: uncharted mountain ranges covered with forests and shrouded in fog are perfect for this. Most of the civilians in the surrounding areas are local tribes. Every time a scientific expedition goes to the northern mountains of Colombia, it discovers there previously unknown plants and animals. In 2006, a new species of birds, the Yarik atlapet, was discovered, and in 2010, a new subspecies of the bird, Lachrymose Mountain-Tanager.
New Guinea - the last of the little-studied large islands. More than a thousand different ethnic groups and hundreds of very different tribes live here, some of which are completely isolated from the influence of the modern world. On the slopes of the Foggia Mountains in the western part of New Guinea in 2005, a group of American researchers discovered what they called the "Garden of Eden". The territory of about 300 thousand hectares was isolated from the impact of the surrounding world, and there were found more than 20 previously unknown species of frogs, several species of butterflies, tree kangaroos, six birds of paradise (which were previously considered extinct), as well as species of palm trees unknown to science and many other plants . At the same time, many animals were not afraid of man and even allowed scientists to control themselves.
The northeastern part of Siberia, located northeast of the Lena River, is known for its harsh nature and climate. The winters are long, with severe frosts, and the summer is very, very cool. It is here that the "pole of cold" - Oymyakon. Northeastern Siberia has a complex relief of fold-block areas and ridges. Permafrost is also common on the territory. Farming in this region in the open ground is impossible, and the development of natural resources is difficult because of the climatic conditions, the remoteness of the area, the lack of a wide network of transport routes (primarily railways). This territory is the most sparsely populated part of Eurasia, and most of the human presence here is associated with the constant search for minerals.
Material was first published on Look At Me
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