Due to the lack of surface waters and a fairly hot climate, desert planets were deemed uninhabitable.
Most planets of this type have a small size, on average, no more than 1300 kilometers in diameter. The rather small size of these planets, compared to other planets in the cluster, gave researchers reason to believe that desert-type planets are fragments of giant planets that once existed and subsequently collided with each other, of which there are currently very few left in all the galaxies of the cluster - about 10.
Having studied the composition of the soil of desert planets, the researchers managed to discover giant deposits of a valuable metal - polyonium. Surprisingly, the deposits found are incredibly close to the surface, and in some places, they even protrude from the sand dunes in the form of high stalagmites at 5-70 meters in height.
By taking samples of polyoniym from the surface of one of the desert planets, geologists were able to determine a number of useful properties of this metal. Researchers have found it widely used in shipbuilding.
Polyonium
After polyonium became widely used for the repair and construction of spacecraft, there was a need for automation of its extraction.
Engineers of the Polus Corporation have developed a fully autonomous mine for the extraction of polyonium on hot desert planets, powered by thermal generators.
The surface of desert planets consists mainly of high sand hills, with basalt mountains often protruding to the surface. Due to the sufficiently strong gravitational field, desert planets often attract small space objects, and when they collide with them, numerous craters appear on their surface. It was also noticed that during various tectonic processes that took place many millions of years ago, faults and troughs of different sizes formed on the surface of the planets.