9-million-year-old capybara relative found in Atacama hints desert was once wet

The Atacama Desert is a landscape where water is measured in millimetres, not rivers. Today, parts of this vast Chilean desert receive almost no rain, making the discovery of an animal that depended on plentiful freshwater all the more surprising. Buried in an ancient deposit, a single tooth has now offered scientists another glimpse of a very different Atacama, one with wetlands, vegetation and enough water to support a large, semi-aquatic rodent.According to a report by Live Science, researchers identified the roughly 9-million-year-old tooth as belonging to an extinct relative of today's capybaras, adding to growing evidence that the Atacama was not continuously hyperarid throughout its long geological history.A surprising fossil in the desertThe Atacama occupies northern Chile and is considered one of the oldest and driest deserts on Earth. Its hyperarid core receives less than 2 millimetres of rainfall per month in some areas.