What is "nabkha"

A nabkha or nebkha is a type of sand dune. Other terms used include coppice dune and dune hummock or hummocky dune, but these more accurately refer to similar, but different, sand dune types. Authors have also used the terms phytogenic hillock, bush-mound, shrub-coppice dune, knob dune, dune tumulus, rebdou, nebbe, and takouit.

In simplest terms, a nabkha is a sand dune that forms around vegetation. It is an aeolian landform, a structure built and shaped by the action of wind.

Nabkhas are common and occur in many regions. Well known nabkha fields occur in the Arabian Desert of Kuwait, the Hotan River Basin in Xinjiang, China, and New Mexico in the United States and adjacent Chihuahua in Mexico.