What is L'Atalante basin?
The '''L'Atalante basin''' is a very salty 'lake' at the bottom of the [[Mediterranean Sea]].<ref name = Aloisi>It is named after one of the research vessels involved in its discovery in 1993. {{cite journal |last1=Aloisi |first1=Giovanni |last2=Castradori |first2=Davide |last3=Cita |first3=Maria Bianca |title=Sediment injection in the pit of the Urania Anoxic brine lake (Eastern Mediterranean) |journal=Rendiconti Lincei |year=2006 |publisher=Springer Milan |volume=17 |issue=3 |pages=243–262 |url=https://dx.doi.org/10.1007/BF02904765 |doi=10.1007/BF02904765 |s2cid=130664992 }}{{Dead link|date=January 2021 |bot=InternetArchiveBot |fix-attempted=yes }}</ref> {{coord|35.18|N|21.41|E|}} It is about 190&nbsp;km (~120 miles) west of the island of [[Crete]].<ref name = Sass>{{cite journal |last1=Sass |first1=Andrea M |last2=McKew |first2=Boyd A |last3=Sass |first3=Henrik |last4=Fichte |first4=Jörg |last5=Timmis |first5=Kenneth N |last6=McGenity |first6=Terry J |year=2008 |title=Diversity of Bacillus-like organisms isolated from deep-sea hypersaline anoxic sediments |journal=Saline Systems |publisher=BioMed Central |volume=4 |issue=8 |page=8 |doi=10.1186/1746-1448-4-8 |doi-access=free |pmid=18541011 |pmc=2464584 }}</ref> It is called a 'lake' because, though it is under more than two miles of water, it is almost completely separate from the sea above it. Its huge salt content prevents the waters [[mix]]ing. Sometimes these lakes are called ''[[brine]] pools''. They are found in many oceans; there is one in the [[Gulf of Mexico]]. == How it formed == L'Atalante is only one of several such lakes underneath the normal waters of the Mediterranean. When the [[Strait of Gibraltar]] was closed, about six [[million]] years ago, the Mediterranean dried up and became a huge salt lake, rather like the [[Dead Sea]] and the [[Great Salt Lake]] are today. Then it dried out completely, leaving an enormous amount of salt.<ref>Hsu, Kenneth J. 1987. ''The Mediterranean was a desert: a voyage of the Glomar Challenger''. Princeton Univer