A collaborative study with the University of Cologne, recently published in Nature Communications, provides compelling evidence that the extreme aridity in the hyperarid core of the Atacama Desert began over 40 million years ago—significantly earlier than previously assumed. The findings require a reconsideration of how deserts form and offer a new perspective on the long-term evolution of Earth's most extreme environments. Researchers from SUERC Centre for the Isotope Sciences are co-authors of a study which casts new light on the history of Earth's driest region, the Atacama Desert in Chile.