WhatFinger


The Journal of Organic Chemistry

France Used to be a Jungle



The reason I started writing professionally for sites such as Daily Galaxy was, first and foremost, so that I could write my own fiction. It is a great tradeoff, don’t get me wrong; I get to write about that which interests me, dig into news, history and science like I would never have had the opportunity to prior. But I consider myself an ‘aspiring author’ first and foremost.

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So every now and then I like to wax poetic in these articles of mine, and attempt to give just a bit of a view in to what it is I’m writing about. You see, the title has already given away the crux of this story. You don’t need a PhD to realize where I’m going with this. But can you imagine it; really imagine it? These days France is one of those thriving metropolitan locations, but with the vast countryside to make up for it. All you have to do is watch the Tour de France (as I do every year, only 5 more months’ friends!) and you can see some of the most beautiful landscapes imaginable. But let’s go back in time, 55 million years, give or take a millennia or two. And consider that what we now see as rainforest in countries like Brazil, once covered France and, probably, subsequently would have covered much of what we know as Western Europe too! So instead of the paved roads leading up to the Champs Elysee, nighttime sparkled with the lights from the Eiffel Tower, and the mass of vineyards that add to the French stereotype of wine lovers, picture a rainforest, huge and sprawling, echoing with the sounds of birds and the chitter-chatter of animals. This is not just mere speculation mind you; rather, it is scientific hypothesis. According to a new study, published in the Jan. 4 issue of The Journal of Organic Chemistry, come reports of the discovery of 55-million-year-old pieces of amber, found near the Oise River in northern France. Amber, which oozes from trees and later forms the hard pieces of amber, have strong chemical signatures that make it easy to track them. The organic compound found within this French amber, has only one precursor, produced by a tree only found in the Amazon rainforest, in Brazil. “The region corresponding to modern France could have been found in a geographically critical marshy zone belonging to Africa and a tropical zone 55 million years ago extending through North Africa to the Amazon,” the authors wrote. So though the information is small, let your minds wander just for a moment and consider just what it is this information tells us about our planet; and just how small our lives are and the impact we make, compared to all that has come before. Joshua Hill, a Geek’s-Geek from Melbourne, Australia, Josh is an aspiring author with dreams of publishing his epic fantasy, currently in the works, sometime in the next 5 years. A techie, nerd, sci-fi nut and bookworm.


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