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A world map is a map of the surface of the Earth, which may be made using any of a number of different map projections.
Maps of the world are often either 'political' or 'physical'. The most important purpose of the political map is to show territorial borders; the purpose of the physical map is to show features of geography such as mountains, soil type or land use. Geological maps show not only the physical surface, but characteristics of the underlying rock, fault lines, and subsurface structures.
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Projections
Maps that depict the surface of the Earth use a projection, a way of translating the three-dimensional real surface of the geoid to a two-dimensional picture. Perhaps the best-known world-map projection is the Mercator Projection, originally designed as a form of nautical chart.
Airplane pilots use aeronautical charts based on a Lambert conformal conic projection, in which a cone is laid over the section of the earth to be mapped. The cone intersects the sphere (the earth) at one or two parallels which are chosen as standard lines. This allows the pilots to plot a great circle (shortest distance) route approximation on a flat, two-dimensional chart.
Variations
Different from the world map used in Western Hemisphere, in East Asian countries, such as The People's Republic of China, Japan and Korea, along with in Australia and New Zealand, another map is used which places American continents on the right, Europe and Africa on the left, and Asia-Pacific countries roughly on the centre.
Since Africa-centred maps give a rather strong distortion of North America, there are also maps that put America in the centre.
In Australia, reversed maps, with the south (and therefore Australia) at the top, are available, mainly for the tourist industry.
Gallery
 Elevation map |
 Topographical map of the world |
|
 A reversed map, challenging the tradition of north as "up" |
 A blank political map of the world |
 World map according to Posidonius (150-130 B.C.) |
 Tabula Rogeriana world map by Muhammad al-Idrisi in 1154 |
 A World map produced in Amsterdam 1689 |
 A simple political map of the World as of 2003 |
 Present day Earth altimetry and bathymetry (Mollweide projection) |
 A standard blank map |
 Volcano Map |
See also
- Blank maps of the world for historical use
- European Digital Archive on Soil Maps of the World
- OneGeology
- Ancient world maps
- List of World Map changes
- Mappa mundi
- Time zone
Projections
- Albers projection
- Azimuthal conformal projection: see Stereographic projection
- Azimuthal equidistant projection
- Behrmann projection
- Bonne projection
- Bottomley projection
- Cahill octahedral Butterfly projection: see Bernard J.S. Cahill
- Craig retroazimuthal projection
- Dymaxion projection
- Equirectangular projection
- Gall-Peters projection
- Gnomonic projection
- Goode homolosine projection
- Hammer projection
- Hobo-Dyer projection
- Lambert azimuthal equal-area projection
- Lambert conformal conic projection
- Lambert cylindrical equal-area projection
- Littrow projection
- Mercator projection
- Miller cylindrical projection
- Mollweide projection
- Peters projection
- Plate carrée projection
- Polyconic projection
- Robinson projection
- Sinusoidal projection
- Stereographic projection
- Transverse Mercator projection
- Waterman "Butterfly" World Map Projection
- Werner projection
- Winkel Tripel projection
References
- ^ Large-Scale Distortions in Map Projections, 2007, David M. Goldberg & J. Richard Gott III, 2007, V42 N4.
External links
- World map at WikiMapia
- World maps from the CIA World Factbook
- An interactive JAVA applet to study deformations (area, distance, angle) of world maps
- A small collection of world maps viewed from a reversed perspective
- Large world maps
- Illustrated maps
- Free PDF Outline Maps
- United Nations Map Library
- University of Texas Map Collection
- Interactive world-wide map including country sub-divisions
- Java world map allowing different projections and orientations
- (European Digital Archive on the Soil Maps of the World - EuDASM)
- B.J.S. Cahill's Butterfly Map and Beyond: A Comparative Gallery of Octahedral World Maps
- Fascinating selection of world maps at ODT Maps
- Brief History of Maps and Cartography
Wikipedia content modification information:
- This page was last modified on 17 November 2008, at 19:39.
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