the plain between the eastern spur of Tien Shan and the Hami Depression on the north and the Bei Mountains on the south, in the Sinkiang Uighur Autonomous Region of China. It is a region of rolling hills, with a complex labyrinth of wide depressions, separated by flat hills and rocky ridges up to 100 m high. It is a rocky, often gravelly waterless desert; there are solonchaks in the closed depressions. The climate is very continental—the maximum temperature in the summer reaches 40° C; in the winter, the minimum approaches -32° C. Precipitation is less than 50 mm per year. Vegetation is very thin; some plants grow along temporarily wet riverbeds—occasional tamarisk bushes, saxaul, and Nitraria. There are also annual saltworts. Its fauna includes Persian gazelles, wild asses (kulan-jigetai), wild camels, and abundant rodents and reptiles.