Over the past 130,000 years, damp climatic phases turned the Arabian Desert four times into a green savannah dotted with lakes. These phases only lasted between 4,000 and 7,000 years, as geologists of the Oeschger Centre demonstrated based on studies of fossil lacustrine sediments and stalagmites. For the migration of Homo sapiens from Africa to Europe and Asia, however, they were of great significance. These findings are the results of the doctoral thesis by Thomas Rosenberg. On their journey to a "global species" modern humans left Eastern Africa 150,000 years ago. For centuries, researchers have grappled with questions about the route Homo sapiens took and the time when was it possible to cross the inhospitable deserts in North Africa and Arabia. Up until now, it was presumed that our ancestors wandered north across the Nile Valley and through the Middle East. This theory is now challenged by the study, which was published in the renowned journal "Geology."
