"Eso's La Silla Observatory on the outskirts of the Atacama Desert is certainly one of the best astronomical sites in the world, " said Michael Gillon, who leads the exoplanet survey for Trappist.

BBC: New robotic telescope in Chile set for planet hunt

Known as the driest, highest desert in the world, the Atacama Desert is full of surprises: mountains, volcanoes, salt flats, geysers, wetlands, hot springs and an abundance of animal and plant life.

FORBES: Connect

The northern third of the country is dominated by the Atacama Desert, a spectacular region of salt flats, geysers and volcanic peaks.

FORBES: Lapostolle Residence, a Chilean Wine Country Hideaway

This is the monster: the highest volcano on Earth, rising out of the grey moonscape of the Atacama Desert.

BBC: How to climb a South American volcano

Thanks to its strategic location between the Andes, the Atacama Desert and the Pacific Ocean, the Arica and Parinacota region was once the home of three major empires -- Tiwanacu, Inca and Spanish.

BBC: Reviving Chile's Andean heritage

From the 1830s through the 1920s the nitrates in Chile's Atacama Desert were used mainly for explosives, but the market collapsed in the late 1920s with the invention of synthetic nitrates and the onset of the Depression.

FORBES: Patricio Contesse's white gold