The Dead Sea Wonder
The Dead Sea is located in the Dead Sea Rift, which is part of a long fissure in the Earth's surface called the Great Rift Valley.
The 6000 km (3700 mile) long Great Rift Valley extends from the Taurus Mountains of Turkey to the Zambezi Valley in southern Africa.
|
| |
The Great Rift Valley formed in Miocene times as a result of the Arabian Plate moving northward and then eastward away from the African Plate.
The Jordan River is the only major stream flowing into Dead Sea. There are no outlet streams.
The Dead Sea area has become a major center for health research and treatment for several reasons.
The Mineral content of the waters, the very low content of pollens and other allergens in the atmosphere, the reduced ultraviolet component of solar radiation, and the higher atmospheric pressure at this great depth each have specific health effects.
|
For example: persons suffering reduced respiratory
function from diseases such as cystic fibrosis, seem to benefit from the increased atmospheric pressure.
Sufferers of the skin disorder psoriasis also benefit from the ability to sunbathe for long periods in the area due to its position below sea level and subsequent result that many of the sun's harmful UV rays are reduced.
The Mineral content of the Dead Sea is significantly different from that of ocean water, consisting of approximately 53% magnesium chloride,
37% potassium chloride and 8% sodium chloride (common salt) with the remainder comprised of various trace elements.
The concentration of sulfate, SO42-, ions is very low, and the bromide ion concentration is the highest of all waters on Earth.
Chlorides neutralize most of the calcium ions in the Dead Sea and its surroundings.
While in other seas sodium chloride is 97% of the salts, in the Dead Sea the quantity of NaCl is only 12-18%.
Comparison between the chemical composition of the Dead Sea to other lakes and oceans show that the salt concentration in the Dead Sea is 31.5% (the salinity fluctuates somewhat).
Because of its unusually high concentration of salt, anyone can easily float in the Dead Sea because of natural buoyancy as a result of the higher density of the water.
In this aspect, the Dead Sea is similar to the Great Salt Lake in Utah, in the United States.
One of the most unusual properties of the Dead Sea is its discharge of asphalt.
From deep seeps, the Dead Sea constantly spits up small pebbles of the black substance.
After earthquakes, chunks as large as houses may be produced.
A Bit Of History
Until the winter of 1978-1979, the Dead Sea was composed of two stratified layers of water that differed in temperature, density, age, and salinity.
The topmost 35 meters or so of the Dead Sea had a salinity that ranged between 300 and 400 parts per thousand and a temperature that swung between 19 °C (66 °F) and 37 °C (98 °F).
Underneath a zone of transition, the lowest level of the Dead Sea had waters of a consistent 22 °C (72 °F) temperature and complete saturation of sodium chloride (NaCl).
|
| |
Since the water near the bottom is saturated, the salt precipitates out of solution onto the sea floor.
Beginning
in the 1960s water inflow to the Dead Sea from the Jordan River was reduced as a result of large-scale irrigation and generally low rainfall.
By 1975 the upper water layer of the Dead Sea was actually saltier than the lower layer.
The upper layer nevertheless remained suspended above the lower layer because its waters were warmer and thus less dense.
When the upper layer finally cooled down so that its density was greater than the lower layer the waters of the |
Dead Sea mixed.
For the first time in centuries the lake was a homogeneous body of water. Since then stratification has begun to redevelop.
Around three million years ago what is now the valley of the Jordan River, Dead Sea, and Wadi Arabah was repeatedly inundated by waters from the Mediterranean Sea.
The waters formed in a narrow, crooked bay which was connected to the sea through what is now the Jezreel Valley.
The floods of the valley came and went depending on long scale climatic change.
The lake that occupied the Dead Sea Rift, named "Lake Sodom", deposited beds of salt, eventually coming to be 3 km (2 miles) thick.
According to geological theory, approximately two million years ago the land between the Rift Valley and the Mediterranean Sea rose to such an extent that the ocean could no longer flood the area.
Thus, the long bay became a long lake.
The first such prehistoric lake is named "Lake Gomorrah".
Lake Gomorrah was a freshwater or brackish lake that extended at least 80 km (50 miles) south of the current southern end of the Dead Sea and 100 km (60 mi) north, well above the present Hula Depression.
As the climate turned more arid, Lake Gomorrah shrank and became saltier. The large, saltwater predecessor of the Dead Sea is called "Lake Lisan."
In prehistoric times great amounts of sediment collected on the floor of Lake Gomorrah.
The sediment was heavier than the salt deposits and squeezed the salt deposits upwards into what are now the Lisan Peninsula and Mount Sedom (on the southwest side of the lake).
"Geologists explain the effect in terms of a bucket of mud into which a large flat stone is placed, forcing the mud to creep up the sides of the pail".
When the floor of the Dead Sea dropped further due to tectonic forces the salt mounts of Lisan and Mount Sedom stayed in place as high cliffs.
Learn more about Natural Skin Care or Anti-Aging
|
|
Copyright © 2007 Blue Deserts International Ltd. All rights reserved
|
BlueDeserts Offers Unique Dead Sea Products. Our Dead Sea Cosmetics are a complete range of Dead Sea Skin Care Products rich in Dead Sea
Minerals. Discover Dead Sea Mineral Cosmetics.
New - Olive Oil Skin Care products, Olive Oil Soap
|
|
| |
| |
| |
| |
| |
| |
| |
| |
| |
| |
| |
| |
| |
| |
| |
| |
| |
| |
| |
| |
| |
| |
| |
| |
| |
| |
| |
| |
| |
| |
| |
| |
| |
| |
| |
|
Blue Deserts is a Mineral Cosmetic Company Specializing in Dead-Dea Cosmetics.
Dead Sea Anti Aging cosmetics prevent premature wrinkle formation.
Dead Sea Minerals provide valuable skin protection and revitalizing effects of Minerals on your skin.
Most Aloes have a rosette of large, thick, fleshy leaves. The leaves are often lance-shaped with a sharp apex and a spiny margin. Aloe flowers are tubular, frequently yellow, orange or red and are borne on densely clustered, simple or branched leafless stems.
Many species of Aloe are seemingly stemless, with the rosette growing directly at ground level; other varieties may have a branched or un-branched stem from which the fleshy leaves spring. They vary in colour from grey to bright green and are sometimes striped or mottled.
|
|
