Almost exactly halfway across the Atlantic between Africa and South America, just below the equator, lies an island that 200 years ago was uninhabited and was described by one contemporary writer as “the abomination of desolation.” “Ascension produces nothing but turtles, rats and insomnia,” another said. “The most desolate and barren land (like a land accursed by God) that ever my eyes beheld… I believe the whole world affords not such another piece of ground,” added a third. Ascension Island is so remote (800 miles from the nearest land, Saint Helena; 960 miles from the nearest point in Africa; and 1,400 miles from Brazil) that not a single seed from any plant reached it until humans — specifically the British — settled there. “There is no soil, no shade, no plants, no water,” wrote one of its first inhabitants. And yet Ascension has held enormous geostrategic importance since its discovery and, despite that desolation — or precisely because of it — now has huge environmental value. The island was also visited by the famous writer, scientist, and revolutionary of biology, Charles Darwin. Thanks to him and to a story of courage, stubbornness, biology, and engineering, this unlikely island might hold the secret to combating desertification worldwide, and a young Spanish scientist is working to test that idea.

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