TheAmazon Rainforest also known in English as Amazonia or the Amazon Jungle is a humid broadleaf forest that cover ups most of the Amazon Basin of South America. This sink encompasses 7 million square kilometers, of which five and a half million square kilometers are covered by the rainforest. This region includes territory belonging to nine nations. The majority of the forest is contained within Brazil, with 60% of the rainforest, followed by Peru with 13%,rolex oyster perpetual real or fake and with minor amounts in Colombia, Venezuela, Ecuador, Bolivia, Guyana, Suriname and France (French Guiana). States or departments in four nations bear the name Amazonas after it. The Amazon represents over half of the planet's remaining rainforests, and it comprises the largest and most species-rich tract of tropical rainforest in the world.

The Amazon rainforest was picking out in 2008 as a candidate to one of the New7Wonders of Nature by the New Seven Wonders of the World Foundation. As of February 2009 the Amazon was ranking first in Group E, the category for forests, national parks and nature reserves.

History

The rainforest probable formed during the Eocene era. It comes into viewed following a global reduction of tropical temperatures when the Atlantic Ocean had widened sufficiently to provide a warm, moist climate to the Amazon basin. The rain forest has been in existence for at least 55 million years, and most of the region remained free of savanna-type biomes at least until replica watches new york the current ice age, when the climate was drier and savanna more widespread.

Following the Cretaceous–Tertiary extinction event, the annihilation of the dinosaurs and the wetter climate may have allowed the tropical rainforest to spread out crossways the continent. From 65–34 Mya, the rainforest extended as far south as 45°. Climate fluctuations during the last thirty four million years have allowed savanna regions to expand into the tropics. During the Oligocene, for example, the rainforest spanned a relatively narrow band that lay mostly above latitude 15°N. It expanded again during the Middle Miocene, and then retracted to a mostly inland formation at the last glacial maximum. However, the rainforest still managed to thrive during these glacial periods, allowing for the survival and evolution of a broad diversity of species.

During the mid-Eocene, it is supposed that the drainage basin of the Amazon was split along the center of the continent by the Purus Arch. Water on the eastern side flowed toward the Atlantic, while to the west water flowed toward the rolex watches replica uk Pacific across the Amazonas Basin. As the Andes Mountains rose, however, a large basin was created that enclosed a lake; now known as the Solimões Basin. Within the last 5–10 million years, this accumulating water broke through the Purus Arch, joining the easterly flow toward the Atlantic.