1.
Geographic coordinate system
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A geographic coordinate system is a coordinate system used in geography that enables every location on Earth to be specified by a set of numbers, letters or symbols. The coordinates are chosen such that one of the numbers represents a vertical position. A common choice of coordinates is latitude, longitude and elevation, to specify a location on a two-dimensional map requires a map projection. The invention of a coordinate system is generally credited to Eratosthenes of Cyrene. Ptolemy credited him with the adoption of longitude and latitude. Ptolemys 2nd-century Geography used the prime meridian but measured latitude from the equator instead. Mathematical cartography resumed in Europe following Maximus Planudes recovery of Ptolemys text a little before 1300, in 1884, the United States hosted the International Meridian Conference, attended by representatives from twenty-five nations. Twenty-two of them agreed to adopt the longitude of the Royal Observatory in Greenwich, the Dominican Republic voted against the motion, while France and Brazil abstained. France adopted Greenwich Mean Time in place of local determinations by the Paris Observatory in 1911, the latitude of a point on Earths surface is the angle between the equatorial plane and the straight line that passes through that point and through the center of the Earth. Lines joining points of the same latitude trace circles on the surface of Earth called parallels, as they are parallel to the equator, the north pole is 90° N, the south pole is 90° S. The 0° parallel of latitude is designated the equator, the plane of all geographic coordinate systems. The equator divides the globe into Northern and Southern Hemispheres, the longitude of a point on Earths surface is the angle east or west of a reference meridian to another meridian that passes through that point. All meridians are halves of great ellipses, which converge at the north and south poles, the prime meridian determines the proper Eastern and Western Hemispheres, although maps often divide these hemispheres further west in order to keep the Old World on a single side. The antipodal meridian of Greenwich is both 180°W and 180°E, the combination of these two components specifies the position of any location on the surface of Earth, without consideration of altitude or depth. The grid formed by lines of latitude and longitude is known as a graticule, the origin/zero point of this system is located in the Gulf of Guinea about 625 km south of Tema, Ghana. To completely specify a location of a feature on, in, or above Earth. Earth is not a sphere, but a shape approximating a biaxial ellipsoid. It is nearly spherical, but has an equatorial bulge making the radius at the equator about 0. 3% larger than the radius measured through the poles, the shorter axis approximately coincides with the axis of rotation
2.
Country
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A country is a region that is identified as a distinct national entity in political geography. Sometimes the word countries is used to both to sovereign states and to other political entities, while other times it refers only to states. The word country comes from Old French contrée, itself derived from Vulgar Latin contrata and it most likely entered the English language after the Franco-Norman invasion during the 11th century. Areas much smaller than a state may be called by names such as the West Country in England, the Black Country, Constable Country. In many European countries the words are used for sub-divisions of the territory, as in the German Bundesländer. The modern Italian contrada is a word with its meaning varying locally, the term country is frequently used to refer to sovereign states. There is no agreement on the number of countries in the world. There are 206 sovereign states, of which 193 states are members of the United Nations, all are defined as states by declarative theory of statehood and constitutive theory of statehood. The latest proclaimed state is South Sudan in 2011, the Kingdom of Denmark, a sovereign state, comprises Metropolitan Denmark and two nominally separate countries—the Faroe Islands, and Greenland—which are almost fully internally self-governing. The Kingdom of the Netherlands, a state, comprises four separate countries, Netherlands, Aruba, Curaçao. The degree of autonomy of non-sovereign countries varies widely, some are possessions of sovereign states, as several states have overseas territories, with citizenry at times identical and at times distinct from their own
3.
Brazil
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Brazil, officially the Federative Republic of Brazil, is the largest country in both South America and Latin America. As the worlds fifth-largest country by area and population, it is the largest country to have Portuguese as an official language. Its Amazon River basin includes a vast tropical forest, home to wildlife, a variety of ecological systems. This unique environmental heritage makes Brazil one of 17 megadiverse countries, Brazil was inhabited by numerous tribal nations prior to the landing in 1500 of explorer Pedro Álvares Cabral, who claimed the area for the Portuguese Empire. Brazil remained a Portuguese colony until 1808, when the capital of the empire was transferred from Lisbon to Rio de Janeiro, in 1815, the colony was elevated to the rank of kingdom upon the formation of the United Kingdom of Portugal, Brazil and the Algarves. Independence was achieved in 1822 with the creation of the Empire of Brazil, a state governed under a constitutional monarchy. The ratification of the first constitution in 1824 led to the formation of a bicameral legislature, the country became a presidential republic in 1889 following a military coup détat. An authoritarian military junta came to power in 1964 and ruled until 1985, Brazils current constitution, formulated in 1988, defines it as a democratic federal republic. The federation is composed of the union of the Federal District, the 26 states, Brazils economy is the worlds ninth-largest by nominal GDP and seventh-largest by GDP as of 2015. A member of the BRICS group, Brazil until 2010 had one of the worlds fastest growing economies, with its economic reforms giving the country new international recognition. Brazils national development bank plays an important role for the economic growth. Brazil is a member of the United Nations, the G20, BRICS, Unasul, Mercosul, Organization of American States, Organization of Ibero-American States, CPLP. Brazil is a power in Latin America and a middle power in international affairs. One of the worlds major breadbaskets, Brazil has been the largest producer of coffee for the last 150 years and it is likely that the word Brazil comes from the Portuguese word for brazilwood, a tree that once grew plentifully along the Brazilian coast. In Portuguese, brazilwood is called pau-brasil, with the word brasil commonly given the etymology red like an ember, formed from Latin brasa and the suffix -il. As brazilwood produces a red dye, it was highly valued by the European cloth industry and was the earliest commercially exploited product from Brazil. The popular appellation eclipsed and eventually supplanted the official Portuguese name, early sailors sometimes also called it the Land of Parrots. In the Guarani language, a language of Paraguay, Brazil is called Pindorama
4.
States of Brazil
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The Federative Republic of Brazil is a union of 27 Federative Units,26 states and one federal district, where the federal capital, Brasília, is located. The states are based on historical, conventional borders which have developed over time. The Federal District is not formally a state, but shares some characteristics of a state as well as some of a municipality, the codes given below are defined in ISO 3166-2, BR. The first administrative divisions of Brazil were the hereditary captaincies, stretches of land granted by the Portuguese Crown to noblemen or merchants with a charter to colonize the land, as the map shows, these divisions generally followed lines of latitude. Each of the holders of these captaincies was referred to as a captain donatary and these captaincies were to be passed from father to son, but the Crown retained the power to revoke them, which the King indeed did in the 16th century. In 1549, the Portuguese Crown appointed Tomé de Sousa as the first governor-general of the vast Portuguese dominion in South America and this dominion overall became known as the State of Brazil. In several periods of history, the half of the dominion was detached from the State of Brazil. Unlike Spanish America, the territory remained united under a single governor-general. This arrangement later helped to keep Brazil as a unified nation-state, in 1759, the heritability of the captaincies was totally abolished by the government of the Marquis of Pombal, with all captains becoming appointed by the Crown. The captaincies were officially renamed provinces on 28 February 1821, with independence, in 1822, the former captaincies became provinces of the Empire of Brazil. Most internal boundaries were unchanged from the colonial period, generally following natural features such as rivers. Minor changes were made to domestic politics, as well as additions resulting from diplomatic settlement of territorial disputes by the end of the 19th century. When Brazil became a republic in 1889, all provinces immediately became states, after the war, the first four territories became states, with Rio Branco and Guaporé being renamed Roraima and Rondônia, respectively, whilst Ponta Porã and Iguaçu remained as territories. In 1960, the square-shaped Distrito Federal was carved out of Goiás in preparation for the new capital, Brasília. The previous federal district became Guanabara State, but in 1975 it was merged with Rio de Janeiro State, retaining its name, in 1977, Mato Grosso was split into two states. The northern area retained the name Mato Grosso while the area became the state of Mato Grosso do Sul. The new Mato Grosso do Sul incorporated the territory of Ponta Porã, central Iguaçu went to Paraná, and southern Iguaçu went to Santa Catarina. In 1988, the portion of Goiás became the state of Tocantins
5.
Pernambuco
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Pernambuco is a state of Brazil, located in the Northeast region of the country. The state of Pernambuco also includes the archipelago Fernando de Noronha and its capital and largest city, Recife, is one of the most important economic and urban hubs in the country. As of 2013 estimates, Recifes metropolitan area is the fifth most populous in the country, in 1982 the city of Olinda, the second oldest city in Brazil, was declared a World Heritage Site by UNESCO. Recife, the capital and Olinda have one of the most traditional Brazilian Carnivals. Both have architecture of Portugal, with centuries-old casarões and churches, kilometers of beaches, the proximity of the equator guarantees sunshine throughout the year, with average temperatures of 26 °C. Pernambuco comprises a narrow coastal zone, a high inland plateau. Ranges of these form the boundary lines with three states–the Serra dos Irmãos and Serra Vermelha with Piauí, the Serra do Araripe with Ceará. The coastal area is fertile, and was covered by the humid Pernambuco coastal forests. It is now place to extensive sugar cane plantations and it has a hot, humid climate, relieved to some extent by the south-east trade winds. The middle zone, called the region, has a drier climate and lighter vegetation, including the semi-deciduous Pernambuco interior forests. The inland region, called the sertão is high, stony, and dry, the climate is characterized by hot days and cool nights. There are two defined seasons, a rainy season from March to June, and a dry season for the remaining months. The interior of the state is covered mostly by the dry thorny scrub vegetation called caatinga, the Rio São Francisco is the main water source for this area. The climate is mild in the countryside of the state because of the Borborema Plateau. Some towns are located more than 1000 meters above sea level, the island of Fernando de Noronha in the Atlantic Ocean,535 km northeast of Recife, has been part of Pernambuco since 1988. The rivers of the include a number of small plateau streams flowing southward to the São Francisco River. The former are the Moxotó, Ema, Pajeú, Terra Nova, Brigida, Boa Vista and Pontai, a large tributary of the Uná, the Rio Jacuhipe, forms part of the boundary line with Alagoas. Originally inhabited by tribes of Tupi-Guarani speaking indigenous peoples, Pernambuco was first settled by the Portuguese in the 16th century
6.
1503
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Year 1503 was a common year starting on Sunday of the Julian calendar. January 20 – Seville in Castile is awarded exclusive right to trade with the New World, january 24 – Construction of the Henry VII Chapel at Westminster Abbey begins in the perpendicular style, the final stage of English gothic art. February 11– Queen Elizabeth of York, wife of Henry VII of England, dies on her 37th birthday, more than a week after giving birth to her daughter Katherine Tudor, february 13 – Challenge of Barletta, Thirteen Italian knights defeat thirteen French knights near Barletta. February 23 – French–Spanish Wars in Italy – Battle of Ruvo, april 21 – Battle of Seminara, Spanish forces under Fernando de Andrade de las Mariñas defeats the French under Bernard Stewart, 4th Lord of Aubigny. April 28 – Battle of Cerignola, Spanish forces under Gonzalo Fernández de Córdoba defeat the French under Louis dArmagnac, Duke of Nemours, may 10 – Christopher Columbus discovers the Cayman Islands, which he names Las Tortugas after the numerous sea turtles there. May 13 – Naples is captured by the Spanish, may 20 – Ascension Island is first definitely sighted, by Portuguese admiral Afonso de Albuquerque. May 28 James IV of Scotland and Margaret Tudor are married by Pope Alexander VI according to Papal bull, the Treaty of Everlasting Peace between Scotland and England is signed, it actually lasts for ten years. July 23 – Orbital calculations suggest that on this day, Pluto moves outside Neptunes orbit, july 30 – Saint Helena is first definitely sighted, by ships of Portuguese navigator Estêvão da Gama returning from the East. August 8 – King James IV of Scotland marries Margaret Tudor, daughter of King Henry VII of England at Holyrood Abbey, Edinburgh, Scotland. August 20 – Stephen III of Moldavia concludes a treaty with Sultan Bayezid II preserving Moldavias self-rule at the cost of a tribute to the Ottoman Empire. September 22 – Pope Pius III succeeds Alexander VI as the 215th pope, October 30 – Queen Isabella I of Spain prohibits violence against native tribes. October 31 – Pope Julius II succeeds Pius III as the 216th pope, december 29 – Battle of Garigliano, near Gaeta, Italy, Spanish forces under Gonzalo Fernández de Córdoba defeat a French–Italian mercenary army under Ludovico II, Marquess of Saluzzo. The French forces withdraw to Gaeta, vasco da Gama establishes Indias first Portuguese fortress at Cochin. The Canterbury Cathedral is finished in England after 433 years of construction, mariotto Albertinelli paints his work, The Visitation of the Virgin. Hieronymus Bosch works on the triptych The Garden of Earthly Delights, leonardo da Vinci starts work on the Mona Lisa. The book The Imitation of Christ by Thomas à Kempis is re-published in an English translation, the pocket handkerchief comes into general use in polite European society. From this year until 1650, sixteen million kilograms of silver and 185,000 kilograms of gold will enter the port of Seville
7.
Demonym
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A demonym is a word that identifies residents or natives of a particular place, which is derived from the name of that particular place. It is a neologism, previously gentilic was recorded in English dictionaries, e. g. the Oxford English Dictionary, thus a Thai may be any resident or citizen of Thailand, of any ethnic group, or more narrowly a member of the Thai people. Conversely, some groups of people may be associated with multiple demonyms, for example, a native of the United Kingdom may be called a British person, a Brit, or a Briton. In some languages, when a parallel demonym does not exist, in English, demonyms are capitalized and are often the same as the adjectival form of the place, e. g. Egyptian, Japanese, or Greek. Significant exceptions exist, for instance the adjectival form of Spain is Spanish, English widely includes country-level demonyms such as Ethiopian or Guatemalan and more local demonyms such as Seoulite, Wisconsinite, Chicagoan, Michigander, Fluminense, and Paulista. Some places lack a commonly used and accepted demonym and this poses a particular challenge to those toponymists who research demonyms. The word gentilic comes from the Latin gentilis and the English suffix -ic, the word demonym was derived from the Greek word meaning populace with the suffix for name. National Geographic attributes the term demonym to Merriam-Webster editor Paul Dickson in a recent work from 1990 and it was subsequently popularized in this sense in 1997 by Dickson in his book Labels for Locals. However, in What Do You Call a Person From, a Dictionary of Resident Names attributed the term to George H. Scheetz, in his Names Names, A Descriptive and Prescriptive Onymicon, which is apparently where the term first appears. Several linguistic elements are used to create demonyms in the English language, the most common is to add a suffix to the end of the location name, slightly modified in some instances. Cairo → Cairene Cyrenaica → Cyrene Damascus → Damascene Greece → Greek Nazareth → Nazarene Slovenia → Slovene Often used for Middle Eastern locations and European locations. Kingston-upon-Hull → Hullensian Leeds → Leodensian Spain → Spaniard Savoy → Savoyard -ese is usually considered proper only as an adjective, thus, a Chinese person is used rather than a Chinese. Monaco → Monégasque Menton → Mentonasque Basque Country → Basque Often used for French locations, mostly they are from Africa and the Pacific, and are not generally known or used outside the country concerned. In much of East Africa, a person of an ethnic group will be denoted by a prefix. For example, a person of the Luba people would be a Muluba, the plural form Baluba, similar patterns with minor variations in the prefixes exist throughout on a tribal level. And Fijians who are indigenous Fijians are known as Kaiviti and these demonyms are usually more informal and colloquial. In the United States such informal demonyms frequently become associated with mascots of the sports teams of the state university system. In other countries the origins are often disputed and these will typically be formed using the standard models above
8.
Portuguese language
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Portuguese is a Romance language and the sole official language of Portugal, Brazil, Cape Verde, Guinea-Bissau, Mozambique, Angola, and São Tomé and Príncipe. It also has co-official language status in East Timor, Equatorial Guinea, Portuguese is part of the Ibero-Romance group that evolved from several dialects of Vulgar Latin in the medieval Kingdom of Galicia, and has kept some Celtic phonology. Portuguese is also termed the language of Camões, after Luís Vaz de Camões, one of the greatest literary figures in the Portuguese language and author of the Portuguese epic poem, the museum is the first of its kind in the world. In 2015 the museum was destroyed in a fire, but there are plans to reconstruct it, when the Romans arrived in the Iberian Peninsula in 216 BCE, they brought the Latin language with them, from which all Romance languages descend. Between 409 CE and 711 CE, as the Roman Empire collapsed in Western Europe, Portuguese evolved from the medieval language, known today by linguists as Galician-Portuguese, Old Portuguese or Old Galician, of the northwestern medieval Kingdom of Galicia. It is in Latin administrative documents of the 9th century that written Galician-Portuguese words and this phase is known as Proto-Portuguese, which lasted from the 9th century until the 12th-century independence of the County of Portugal from the Kingdom of León, by then reigning over Galicia. In the first part of the Galician-Portuguese period, the language was used for documents. For some time, it was the language of preference for poetry in Christian Hispania. Portugal became an independent kingdom in 1139, under King Afonso I of Portugal, in the second period of Old Portuguese, in the 15th and 16th centuries, with the Portuguese discoveries, the language was taken to many regions of Africa, Asia and the Americas. The language continued to be popular in parts of Asia until the 19th century, some Portuguese-speaking Christian communities in India, Sri Lanka, Malaysia, and Indonesia preserved their language even after they were isolated from Portugal. The end of the Old Portuguese period was marked by the publication of the Cancioneiro Geral by Garcia de Resende, Most literate Portuguese speakers were also literate in Latin, and thus they easily adopted Latin words into their writing—and eventually speech—in Portuguese. Portuguese is the language of the majority of people in Brazil and Portugal, perhaps 75% of the population of Angola speaks Portuguese natively, and 85% are fluent. Just over 40% of the population of Mozambique are native speakers of Portuguese, Portuguese is also spoken natively by 30% of the population in Guinea-Bissau, and a Portuguese-based creole is understood by all. No data is available for Cape Verde, but almost all the population is bilingual, there are also significant Portuguese speaking immigrant communities in many countries including Andorra, Bermuda, Canada, France, Japan, Jersey, Namibia, Paraguay, Macau, Switzerland, Venezuela. In some parts of former Portuguese India, namely Goa and Daman and Diu, in 2014, an estimated 1,500 students were learning Portuguese in Goa. Equatorial Guinea made an application for full membership to the CPLP in June 2010. In 2011, Portuguese became its official language and, in July 2014. Portuguese is a subject in The school curriculum in Uruguay
9.
Archipelago
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An archipelago, sometimes called an island group or island chain, is a chain, cluster or collection of islands. The word archipelago is derived from the Greek ἄρχι- – arkhi-, in Italian, possibly following a tradition of antiquity, the Archipelago was the proper name for the Aegean Sea and, later, usage shifted to refer to the Aegean Islands. It is now used to refer to any group or, sometimes. Archipelagos may be isolated in large amounts of water or neighbouring a large land mass. For example, Scotland has more than 700 islands surrounding its mainland which form an archipelago, archipelagos are often volcanic, forming along island arcs generated by subduction zones or hotspots, but may also be the result of erosion, deposition, and land elevation. Depending on their origin, islands forming archipelagos can be referred to as oceanic islands, continental fragments. Oceanic islands are mainly of volcanic origin, continental fragments correspond to land masses that have separated from a continental mass due to tectonic displacement. Indonesia, Japan, Taiwan, the Philippines, New Zealand, Maldives, the Bahamas, Greece, Hawaii, the largest archipelagic state in the world by area and population is Indonesia. Island arc List of landforms List of archipelagos by number of islands List of archipelagos List of islands Chisholm, Hugh, ed. Archipelago
10.
Island
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An island or isle is any piece of sub-continental land that is surrounded by water. Very small islands such as emergent land features on atolls can be called islets, skerries, an island in a river or a lake island may be called an eyot or ait, and a small island off the coast may be called a holm. A grouping of geographically or geologically related islands is called an archipelago, an island may be described as such, despite the presence of an artificial land bridge. Example, Singapore and its causeway, or the various Dutch delta islands, there are two main types of islands in the sea, continental and oceanic. The word island derives from Middle English iland, from Old English igland, Old English ieg is actually a cognate of Swedish ö and German Aue, and related to Latin aqua. There is a difference between islands and continents in terms of geology, continents sit on continental lithosphere which is part of tectonic plates floating high on Earths mantle. Oceanic crust is also part of tectonic plates, but it is denser than continental lithosphere, Islands are either extensions of the oceanic crust or geologically they are part of some continent sitting on continental lithosphere. This holds true for Australia, which sits on its own continental lithosphere, continental islands are bodies of land that lie on the continental shelf of a continent. A special type of island is the microcontinental island, which is created when a continent is rifted. Examples are Madagascar and Socotra off Africa, the Kerguelen Islands, New Caledonia, New Zealand, another subtype is an island or bar formed by deposition of tiny rocks where water current loses some of its carrying capacity. While some are transitory and may disappear if the volume or speed of the current changes, others are stable, oceanic islands are islands that do not sit on continental shelves. The vast majority are volcanic in origin, such as Saint Helena in the South Atlantic Ocean, the few oceanic islands that are not volcanic are tectonic in origin and arise where plate movements have lifted up the ocean floor above the surface. Examples are Saint Peter and Paul Rocks in the Atlantic Ocean, one type of volcanic oceanic island is found in a volcanic island arc. These islands arise from volcanoes where the subduction of one plate under another is occurring, examples are the Aleutian Islands, the Mariana Islands, and most of Tonga in the Pacific Ocean. The only examples in the Atlantic Ocean are some of the Lesser Antilles, another type of volcanic oceanic island occurs where an oceanic rift reaches the surface. There are two examples, Iceland, which is the second largest volcanic island, and Jan Mayen. A third type of oceanic island is formed over volcanic hotspots. A hotspot is more or less stationary relative to the tectonic plate above it
11.
Islet
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An islet is a very small island. As suggested by its origin as islette, an Old French diminutive of isle, use of the term implies small size, but little attention is given to drawing an upper limit on its applicability. Cay or Key – an islet formed by the accumulation of sand deposits atop a reef Motu – A reef islet formed by broken coral and sand. River island – A small islet within the current of a river, rock – A rock, in the sense of a type of islet, is an uninhabited landform composed of rock, lying offshore, and having at most minimal vegetation. Sandbar – An exposed sandbar is another type of islet, Sea stack – A thin, vertical landform jutting out of a body of water. Skerry – A small rocky island, usually defined to be too small for habitation, subsidiary islets – A more technical application is to small land features, isolated by water, lying off the shore of a larger island. Likewise, any emergent land in an atoll is called an islet. Tidal island – Often small islands lie off the mainland of an area, being connected to it in low tide. In the Caribbean and West Atlantic, islets are often called cays or keys, rum Cay in the Bahamas and the Florida Keys off Florida are examples of islets. In the Channel Islands, they are identified by the suffix -hou from the Norse -holm. In Scotland and Ireland, they are often called inches, from the Gaelic innis, which originally meant island, in Ireland they are often termed skerries. In and around Polynesia, islets are widely known by the term motu, in and around the River Thames in England, small islands are known as aits or eyots. One long-term dispute over the status of such an islet was that of Snake Island, there are thousands of islets on Earth, approximately 24,000 islands and islets in the Stockholm archipelago alone. The following is a list of example islets from around the world, Islands or Rocks, Is that the Real Question. The Treatment of Islands in the Delimitation of Maritime Boundaries, in Myron H. Nordquist, John Norton Moore, Alfred H. A. The Law of the Sea Convention, US Accession and Globalization
12.
Atlantic Ocean
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The Atlantic Ocean is the second largest of the worlds oceans with a total area of about 106,460,000 square kilometres. It covers approximately 20 percent of the Earths surface and about 29 percent of its surface area. It separates the Old World from the New World, the Atlantic Ocean occupies an elongated, S-shaped basin extending longitudinally between Eurasia and Africa to the east, and the Americas to the west. The Equatorial Counter Current subdivides it into the North Atlantic Ocean, in contrast, the term Atlantic originally referred specifically to the Atlas Mountains in Morocco and the sea off the Strait of Gibraltar and the North African coast. The Greek word thalassa has been reused by scientists for the huge Panthalassa ocean that surrounded the supercontinent Pangaea hundreds of years ago. The term Aethiopian Ocean, derived from Ancient Ethiopia, was applied to the Southern Atlantic as late as the mid-19th century, many Irish or British people refer to the United States and Canada as across the pond, and vice versa. The Black Atlantic refers to the role of ocean in shaping black peoples history. Irish migration to the US is meant when the term The Green Atlantic is used, the term Red Atlantic has been used in reference to the Marxian concept of an Atlantic working class, as well as to the Atlantic experience of indigenous Americans. Correspondingly, the extent and number of oceans and seas varies, the Atlantic Ocean is bounded on the west by North and South America. It connects to the Arctic Ocean through the Denmark Strait, Greenland Sea, Norwegian Sea, to the east, the boundaries of the ocean proper are Europe, the Strait of Gibraltar and Africa. In the southeast, the Atlantic merges into the Indian Ocean, the 20° East meridian, running south from Cape Agulhas to Antarctica defines its border. In the 1953 definition it extends south to Antarctica, while in later maps it is bounded at the 60° parallel by the Southern Ocean, the Atlantic has irregular coasts indented by numerous bays, gulfs, and seas. Including these marginal seas the coast line of the Atlantic measures 111,866 km compared to 135,663 km for the Pacific. Including its marginal seas, the Atlantic covers an area of 106,460,000 km2 or 23. 5% of the ocean and has a volume of 310,410,900 km3 or 23. 3%. Excluding its marginal seas, the Atlantic covers 81,760,000 km2 and has a volume of 305,811,900 km3, the North Atlantic covers 41,490,000 km2 and the South Atlantic 40,270,000 km2. The average depth is 3,646 m and the maximum depth, the bathymetry of the Atlantic is dominated by a submarine mountain range called the Mid-Atlantic Ridge. It runs from 87°N or 300 km south of the North Pole to the subantarctic Bouvet Island at 42°S, the MAR divides the Atlantic longitudinally into two halves, in each of which a series of basins are delimited by secondary, transverse ridges. The MAR reaches above 2000 m along most of its length, the MAR is a barrier for bottom water, but at these two transform faults deep water currents can pass from one side to the other
13.
Portugal
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Portugal, officially the Portuguese Republic, is a country on the Iberian Peninsula in Southwestern Europe. It is the westernmost country of mainland Europe, to the west and south it is bordered by the Atlantic Ocean and to the east and north by Spain. The Portugal–Spain border is 1,214 kilometres long and considered the longest uninterrupted border within the European Union, the republic also includes the Atlantic archipelagos of the Azores and Madeira, both autonomous regions with their own regional governments. The territory of modern Portugal has been settled, invaded. The Pre-Celts, Celts, Carthaginians and the Romans were followed by the invasions of the Visigothic, in 711 the Iberian Peninsula was invaded by the Moors, making Portugal part of Muslim Al Andalus. Portugal was born as result of the Christian Reconquista, and in 1139, Afonso Henriques was proclaimed King of Portugal, in the 15th and 16th centuries, Portugal established the first global empire, becoming one of the worlds major economic, political and military powers. Portugal monopolized the trade during this time, and the Portuguese Empire expanded with military campaigns led in Asia. After the 1910 revolution deposed the monarchy, the democratic but unstable Portuguese First Republic was established, democracy was restored after the Portuguese Colonial War and the Carnation Revolution in 1974. Shortly after, independence was granted to almost all its overseas territories, Portugal has left a profound cultural and architectural influence across the globe and a legacy of over 250 million Portuguese speakers today. Portugal is a country with a high-income advanced economy and a high living standard. It is the 5th most peaceful country in the world, maintaining a unitary semi-presidential republican form of government and it has the 18th highest Social Progress in the world, putting it ahead of other Western European countries like France, Spain and Italy. Portugal is a pioneer when it comes to drug decriminalization, as the nation decriminalized the possession of all drugs for use in 2001. The early history of Portugal is shared with the rest of the Iberian Peninsula located in South Western Europe, the name of Portugal derives from the joined Romano-Celtic name Portus Cale. Other influences include some 5th-century vestiges of Alan settlements, which were found in Alenquer, Coimbra, the region of present-day Portugal was inhabited by Neanderthals and then by Homo sapiens, who roamed the border-less region of the northern Iberian peninsula. These were subsistence societies that, although they did not establish prosperous settlements, neolithic Portugal experimented with domestication of herding animals, the raising of some cereal crops and fluvial or marine fishing. Chief among these tribes were the Calaicians or Gallaeci of Northern Portugal, the Lusitanians of central Portugal, the Celtici of Alentejo, a few small, semi-permanent, commercial coastal settlements were also founded in the Algarve region by Phoenicians-Carthaginians. Romans first invaded the Iberian Peninsula in 219 BC, during the last days of Julius Caesar, almost the entire peninsula had been annexed to the Roman Republic. The Carthaginians, Romes adversary in the Punic Wars, were expelled from their coastal colonies and it suffered a severe setback in 150 BC, when a rebellion began in the north
14.
Municipality
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It is to be distinguished from the county, which may encompass rural territory and/or numerous small communities such as towns, villages and hamlets. The term municipality may also mean the governing or ruling body of a given municipality, a municipality is a general-purpose administrative subdivision, as opposed to a special-purpose district. The term is derived from French municipalité and Latin municipalis, a municipality can be any political jurisdiction from a sovereign state, such as the Principality of Monaco, or a small village, such as West Hampton Dunes, New York. The power of municipalities range from virtual autonomy to complete subordination to the state, municipalities may have the right to tax individuals and corporations with income tax, property tax, and corporate income tax, but may also receive substantial funding from the state. Similar terms include Spanish ayuntamiento, also called municipalidad, Polish gmina, Dutch/Flemish Gemeente, in Australia, the term local government area is used in place of the generic municipality. Here, the LGA Structure covers only incorporated areas of Australia, incorporated areas are legally designated parts of states and territories over which incorporated local governing bodies have responsibility. In Canada, municipalities are local governments established through provincial and territorial legislation, the Province of Ontario has different tiers of municipalities, including lower, upper, and single tiers. Types of upper tier municipalities in Ontario include counties and regional municipalities, nova Scotia also has regional municipalities, which include cities, counties, districts, or towns as municipal units. In India, a Nagar Palika or Municipality is a local body that administers a city of population 100,000 or more. Under the Panchayati Raj system, it directly with the state government. Generally, smaller cities and bigger towns have a Nagar Palika. Nagar Palikas are also a form of local self-government entrusted with duties and responsibilities. Such a corporation in Great Britain consists of a head as a mayor or provost, since local government reorganisation, the unit in England, Northern Ireland and Wales is known as a district, and in Scotland as a council area. A district may be awarded borough or city status, or can retain its district title, in Jersey, a municipality refers to the honorary officials elected to run each of the 12 parishes into which it is subdivided. This is the highest level of government in this jurisdiction. In the United States, municipality is usually understood as a city, town, village, or other local government unit, in the Peoples Republic of China, a direct-controlled municipality is a city with equal status to a province, Beijing, Tianjin, Shanghai, and Chongqing. In Taiwan, a municipality is a city with equal status to a province, Kaohsiung, New Taipei, Taichung, Tainan, Taipei. In Portuguese language usage, there are two words to distinguish the territory and the administrative organ, when referring to the territory, the word concelho is used, when referring to the organ of State, the word município is used
15.
Rio Grande do Norte
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Rio Grande do Norte is one of the states of Brazil, located in the northeastern region of the country, occupying the northeasternmost tip of the South American continent. Because of its position, Rio Grande do Norte has a strategic importance. The capital and largest city is Natal and it is the land of the folklorist Luís da Câmara Cascudo and, according to NASA, it has the purest air in the Americas. Its 410 km of sand, much sun, coconut palms, Rocas Atoll, the only such feature in the Atlantic Ocean, is part of the state. The state is also closest to the archipelago of Fernando de Noronha, Rio Grande do Norte is dominated by its coastline. The state is famed for its beaches and sand dunes, and the air is, according to NASA, two climates predominate, humid tropical, in the oriental littoral, and semi-arid, in the remaining of the State. There are also many mangroves in the state, and the interior is dominated by rainforest, Rocas Atoll in the Atlantic Ocean,260 km Northeast of Natal, also belongs to the state of Rio Grande do Norte. It is contained in the fully protected Atol das Rocas Biological Reserve, the first European to reach the region may have been the Spaniard Alonso de Ojeda in 1499. The Vespucci expedition also named the Potengi river, whose considerably large mouth contrasted with the bodies of water, Rio Grande, after which the Captaincy, Province. For decades thereafter, no permanent European settlement was established in the area, in the 16th century, it was explored by French pirates in search for brazilwood. In 1598, the Portuguese built the Forte dos Reis Magos and, in the following year, rasing cattle and sugarcane plantation lifted the local development and economy. In 1633, the became a battleground between the expansionist Portuguese, seeking to take more land for their Brazilian territories, and the Dutch. After a short period of peace and prosperity in Olinda and Recife, the prices went down in the market of Amsterdam. The economic problems led the Portuguese settlers and native Brazilians to revolt against the Dutch in what is today as the massacres of Cunhaú. The governor of Bahia promised new Portuguese troops, but most of the rebels were Africans and Amerindians, in 1654, the Dutch were finally cast out. During World War II, Rio Grande do Norte was used as an Allied airbase from which to air raids on German-occupied North Africa. In 1964, Latin Americas first space launch site was constructed in Rio Grande do Norte, Barreira do Inferno, which was often referred to as the Brazilian NASA. The Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics estimates that the population of Rio Grande do Norte was 3,168,133 on December 1,2010, multiracial people make up 52. 48% of the total population
16.
Saint Peter and Saint Paul Archipelago
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The Saint Peter and Saint Paul Archipelago is a group of 15 small islets and rocks in the central equatorial Atlantic Ocean. It lies in the Intertropical Convergence Zone, a region of the Atlantic characterized by low average winds punctuated with local thunderstorms, the islets expose serpentinized abyssal mantle peridotite and kaersutite-bearing ultramafic mylonite atop the worlds highest and yet only second largest megamullion. This grouping is the location in the Atlantic Ocean where the abyssal mantle is exposed above sea level. In 1986, the archipelago was designated a protected area. This is now part of the Fernando de Noronha Environmental Protection Area, since 1998, the Brazilian Navy has maintained a permanently manned research facility on the islands. The main economic activity around the islets is tuna fishing, on April 20,1511, a Portuguese Navy fleet composed of six caravels under the command of Captain Garcia de Noronha discovered the islets by accident while on their journey to India. While navigating in open sea at night, the Saint Peter caravel, under the command of Captain Manuel de Castro Alcoforado. The crew was rescued by the Saint Paul caravel, forming the name given to the islets, on the morning of February 16,1832, the rocks were visited by Charles Darwin on the first leg of his voyage on HMS Beagle around the world. Darwin listed all the fauna he could find, noting that not a plant or even a lichen could be found on the island. Darwin found two birds, a booby and a noddy, a crab that stole the fish intended for baby birds, a fly that lived on the booby. He found a moth that lived on feathers, a beetle, a woodlouse that lived on dung, Darwin felt that these rocks represented how life first took hold on a newly formed outcrop. Darwin was correct in noting that, unusually, these islands were not volcanic. Darwins account formed the basis of an episode in Patrick OBrians historical novel HMS. Surprise, when the naturalist Stephen Maturin is briefly marooned and survives by drinking fouled rainwater, the then called “St. Pauls Rocks” were visited by James Clark Ross on 29 November 1839. He was in charge of an expedition to the Antarctic regions with two vessels, the HMS Erebus and the HMS Terror, robert McCormick gave some geological and biological remarks on St. Pauls Rocks in the report on the expedition. Another famous person to visit the rocks was Ernest Shackleton, on his last expedition to Antarctica, in 1942, during World War II, the islets were declared to be part of the Federal Territory of Fernando de Noronha. In early 1960, the served as the starting-point and terminus for the first submerged circumnavigation of the world by the American nuclear-powered submarine USS Triton. On June 25,1998, the Brazilian Navy inaugurated the Saint Peter, the station is manned with four researchers, who are rotated in and out every 15 days
17.
UNESCO
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The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization is a specialized agency of the United Nations based in Paris. It is the heir of the League of Nations International Committee on Intellectual Cooperation, UNESCO has 195 member states and nine associate members. Most of its offices are cluster offices covering three or more countries, national and regional offices also exist. UNESCO pursues its objectives through five major programs, education, natural sciences, social/human sciences, culture and it is also a member of the United Nations Development Group. UNESCO and its mandate for international cooperation can be traced back to a League of Nations resolution on 21 September 1921, on 18 December 1925, the International Bureau of Education began work as a non-governmental organization in the service of international educational development. However, the work of predecessor organizations was largely interrupted by the onset of World War II. On 30 October 1943, the necessity for an organization was expressed in the Moscow Declaration, agreed upon by China, the United Kingdom, the United States. This was followed by the Dumbarton Oaks Conference proposals of 9 October 1944, a prominent figure in the initiative for UNESCO was Rab Butler, the Minister of Education for the United Kingdom. At the ECO/CONF, the Constitution of UNESCO was introduced and signed by 37 countries, the Preparatory Commission operated between 16 November 1945, and 4 November 1946—the date when UNESCOs Constitution came into force with the deposit of the twentieth ratification by a member state. The first General Conference took place between 19 November to 10 December 1946, and elected Dr. Julian Huxley to Director-General and this change in governance distinguished UNESCO from its predecessor, the CICI, in how member states would work together in the organizations fields of competence. In 1956, the Republic of South Africa withdrew from UNESCO claiming that some of the organizations publications amounted to interference in the racial problems. South Africa rejoined the organization in 1994 under the leadership of Nelson Mandela, UNESCOs early work in the field of education included the pilot project on fundamental education in the Marbial Valley, Haiti, started in 1947. This project was followed by missions to other countries, including, for example. In 1948, UNESCO recommended that Member States should make free primary education compulsory, in 1990, the World Conference on Education for All, in Jomtien, Thailand, launched a global movement to provide basic education for all children, youths and adults. Ten years later, the 2000 World Education Forum held in Dakar, Senegal, UNESCOs early activities in culture included, for example, the Nubia Campaign, launched in 1960. The purpose of the campaign was to move the Great Temple of Abu Simbel to keep it from being swamped by the Nile after construction of the Aswan Dam, during the 20-year campaign,22 monuments and architectural complexes were relocated. This was the first and largest in a series of campaigns including Mohenjo-daro, Fes, Kathmandu, Borobudur, the organizations work on heritage led to the adoption, in 1972, of the Convention concerning the Protection of the World Cultural and Natural Heritage. The World Heritage Committee was established in 1976 and the first sites inscribed on the World Heritage List in 1978, since then important legal instruments on cultural heritage and diversity have been adopted by UNESCO member states in 2003 and 2005
18.
World Heritage Site
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A World Heritage Site is a landmark which has been officially recognized by the United Nations, specifically by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization. Sites are selected on the basis of having cultural, historical, scientific or some form of significance. UNESCO regards these sites as being important to the interests of humanity. The programme catalogues, names, and conserves sites of outstanding cultural or natural importance to the common culture, under certain conditions, listed sites can obtain funds from the World Heritage Fund. The program was founded with the Convention Concerning the Protection of the Worlds Cultural and Natural Heritage, since then,192 state parties have ratified the convention, making it one of the most adhered to international instruments. As of July 2016,1052 sites are listed,814 cultural,203 natural, in 1959, the governments of Egypt and Sudan requested UNESCO to assist their countries to protect and rescue the endangered monuments and sites. In 1960, the Director-General of UNESCO launched an appeal to the Member States for an International Campaign to Save the Monuments of Nubia, the campaign, which ended in 1980, was considered a success. The project cost $80 million, about $40 million of which was collected from 50 countries, the projects success led to other safeguarding campaigns, saving Venice and its lagoon in Italy, the ruins of Mohenjo-daro in Pakistan, and the Borobodur Temple Compounds in Indonesia. UNESCO then initiated, with the International Council on Monuments and Sites, the United States initiated the idea of cultural conservation with nature conservation. The International Union for Conservation of Nature developed similar proposals in 1968, the Convention came into force on 17 December 1975. As of June 2016, it has been ratified by 192 states, including 188 UN member states plus the Cook Islands, the Holy See, Niue, a country must first list its significant cultural and natural sites, the result is called the Tentative List. A country may not nominate sites that have not been first included on the Tentative List, next, it can place sites selected from that list into a Nomination File. The Nomination File is evaluated by the International Council on Monuments and Sites and these bodies then make their recommendations to the World Heritage Committee. There are ten selection criteria – a site must meet at least one of them to be included on the list, up to 2004, there were six criteria for cultural heritage and four criteria for natural heritage. In 2005, this was modified so there is now only one set of ten criteria. Nominated sites must be of outstanding value and meet at least one of the ten criteria. Thus, the Geneva Convention treaty promulgates, Article 53, PROTECTION OF CULTURAL OBJECTS AND OF PLACES OF WORSHIP. There are 1,052 World Heritage Sites located in 165 States Party, of these,814 are cultural,203 are natural and 35 are mixed properties
19.
Recife
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The population of the city proper was 1,625,583 in 2016. The city is located at the confluence of the Beberibe and Capibaribe rivers before they flow into the Atlantic Ocean and it is a major port on the Atlantic Ocean. Its name is an allusion to the reefs that are present by the citys shores. The many rivers, small islands and over 50 bridges found in Recife city centre characterise its geography, as of 2010, it is the capital city with the highest HDI in Northeast Brazil and second highest HDI in the entire North and Northeast Brazil. The Metropolitan Region of Recife is the industrial zone of the State of Pernambuco, major products are those derived from cane, ships, oil platforms, electronics, software. With fiscal incentives by the government, many companies were started in the 1970s and 1980s. Recife stands out as a major tourist attraction of the Northeast, the beach of Porto de Galinhas,60 kilometers south of the city, has been repeatedly awarded the title of best beach in Brazil and has drawn many tourists. The Historic Centre of Olinda,7 kilometers north of the city, was declared a UNESCO World Heritage site in 1982, the city is an education hub, and home to the Federal University of Pernambuco, the largest university in Pernambuco. Several Brazilian historical figures, such as the poet and abolitionist Castro Alves, Recife and Natal are the only Brazilian cities with direct flights to the islands of Fernando de Noronha, a World Heritage Site. The city was one of the host cities of the 2014 FIFA World Cup, additionally, Recife hosted the 2013 FIFA Confederations Cup and the 1950 FIFA World Cup. It was a settlement of fishermen and way station for Portuguese sailors. Olinda had been settled in 1536 by captain General Duarte Coelho, the city is named for the long reef recife running parallel to the shoreline which encloses its harbour. The reef is not as sometimes stated, a coral reef, at that time the banks of the Capibaribe River were covered by sugarcane. Recife was capital of the 17th century Dutch Brazil and was called Mauritsstad, the Mascate War of 1710-1711 pitted merchants of Recife against those of nearby Olinda. Due to the proximity to the equator, Recife weather is generally warm. Recife has a number of islands, rivers, waterways and bridges that crisscross the city, Recife is located amidst tropical forests which are distinguished by high rainfall levels resulting in poor soil quality as the rainfall washes away the nutrients. There is an absence of extreme temperatures and a cool breeze due to the winds from the Atlantic Ocean. Recife has a climate, with warm to hot temperatures
20.
Natal, Rio Grande do Norte
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Natal is the capital and largest city of the state Rio Grande do Norte, located in northeastern Brazil. According to IBGEs July 2014 report, the city had a population of 862,044. The implementation of the Via Costeira,10 km long avenue along the shore, the main hotels are concentrated along Via Costeira. Natal has several tourist attractions and is famous for its beauty, for its historical monuments and buildings, for its beaches and also for its off-season carnival. The city also boasts the second largest urban park in Brazil and it is the closest state capital of Brazil to Africa and Europe. The Greater Natal International Airport connects Natal with many Brazilian cities, the city was one of the host cities of the 2014 FIFA World Cup. For decades thereafter, no permanent European settlement was established in the area, Natal was founded on December 25,1599, giving the village outside the fort the modern name of the city. The fort, city, and surrounding areas were occupied by Dutch forces from 1633 to 1654 and they rechristened the fort Fort Ceulen after one of their commanders. The sandy soil of Natal prevented the city becoming a producer of sugarcane during the colonial times. For centuries, the economy of the state was based on the raising of cattle in the dry interior lands. Cattle were sent alive to the centers, to be used as traction, or were turned into jerked beef, for food. In the last century, Natal benefited from the growth of the salt industries, Natal grew quickly, but in a somewhat planned way. Tourists discovered the city, which one of the major tourist destinations in Brazil. Because of its position, an American air base was built in a suburb of Natal named Parnamirim during World War II. This base provided support for allied troops fighting in north Africa, thousands of American soldiers were sent to Natal. Their presence left traces in the culture of the city, Natal is located at 5°46′S 35°12′W, in the far east of South America. The city has an area of 170 square kilometres. Natal lies on the Atlantic Ocean, at the mouth of the Potengi River, Natal has a typical tropical climate, specifically a tropical wet and dry climate, with warm to hot temperatures and high relative humidity all throughout the year
21.
Fernando de Noronha Marine National Park
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Fernando de Noronha Marine National Park is a national park in the state of Pernambuco, Brazil. The Fernando de Noronha Marine National Park covers part of the island of Fernando de Noronha and it has an area of 10,927.64 hectares. The Fernando de Noronha Environmental Protection Area covers the part of the island of Fernando de Noronha. The area includes a large extension to the Saint Peter and Saint Paul Archipelago. The Fernando de Noronha Marine National Park was created by federal decree 96.693 of 14 September 1988 and it is administered by the Chico Mendes Institute for Biodiversity Conservation. The park is classed as IUCN protected area category II, the unofficial management plan was released on 31 December 1990. The advisory council was named on 31 December 2001, a revised management plan with various studies was issued on 29 November 2010. Much of the vegetation of the island was cut when it was used as a prison. After that non-native species, particularly flaxseed, were introduced to feed livestock and have spread uncontrollably, the teju lizard was introduced in an unsuccessful attempt to control an infestation of rats, and the lizard is also a problem. Despite the stated objective of recovery of the environment, sheep continued to be farmed on the island, protected birds in the park include Noronha elaenia, red-billed tropicbird, white-tailed tropicbird, Audubons shearwater, Noronha vireo
22.
Basanite
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This article is about the igneous rock, basanite is also a variety of jasper Basanite is an igneous, volcanic rock with aphanitic to porphyritic texture. Clinopyroxene and olivine are common as phenocrysts and in the matrix, the augite contains significantly greater titanium, aluminium and sodium than that in typical tholeiitic basalt. Quartz is absent, as are orthopyroxene and pigeonite, chemically, basanites are low in silica and high in alkalis compared to basalt, which typically contains more SiO2, as evident on the diagram used for TAS classification. Nephelinite is yet richer in Na2O plus K2O compared to SiO2, basanites occur both on continents and on ocean islands. For example, together with basalts, they are produced by hotspot volcanism in the Hawaiian and the Comoros Islands
23.
Nephelinite
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Nephelinite is a fine-grained or aphanitic igneous rock made up almost entirely of nepheline and clinopyroxene. If olivine is present, the rock may be classified as an olivine nephelinite, nephelinite is dark in color and may resemble basalt in hand specimen. However, basalt consists mostly of clinopyroxene and calcic plagioclase, basalt, alkali basalt, basanite, tephritic nephelinite, and nephelinite differ partly in the relative proportions of plagioclase and nepheline. Alkali basalt may contain minor nepheline and does contain nepheline in its CIPW normative mineralogy, a critical ratio in the classification of these rocks is the ratio nepheline/. Basanite has a value of this ratio between 0.1 and 0.6 and also more than 10% olivine. Tephritic nephelinite has a value between 0.6 and 0.9, nephelinite has a value greater than 0.9. Le Maitre defines and discusses these and other criteria in the classification of igneous rocks, nephelinite is an example of a silica-undersaturated igneous rock. Silica-undersaturated mafic igneous rocks contain magnesian olivine but not magnesian orthopyroxene, silica-saturated igneous rocks fall in between these two classes. Silica-undersaturated, mafic rocks are much less abundant than silica-saturated and oversaturated basalts. Nephelinites are also associated with carbonatite in some occurrences, consistent with source rocks relatively rich in carbon dioxide, nephelinite is found on ocean islands such as Oahu, although the rock type is very rare in the Hawaiian islands. It is found in a variety of continental settings, an example is the Hamada nephelinite lava flow in southwest Japan which occurred in the late Miocene age. Nephelinite is also associated with the highly alkalic volcanism of the Ol Doinyo Lengai volcanic field in Tanzania, Nyiragongo, another African volcano known for its semipermanent lava lake activity, erupts lava made of melilite nephelinite. The unusual chemical makeup of this igneous rock may be a factor in the fluidity of its lavas. Olivine nephelinite flows also occur in the Wells Gray-Clearwater volcanic field in east-central British Columbia, melilite olivine nephelinite intrusives of Cretaceous age are found in the area around Uvalde, Texas. Roger W. Le Maitre, Igneous Rocks, A Classification, ISBN 0-521-66215-X Hamada nephelinite, SW Japan Oldoinyo Lengai volcano, Eastern Rift Valley, North Tanzania Demant, A. Lestrade, P. Lubala, R. T. Kampunzu, A. B. Durieux, J. Volcanological and petrological evolution of Nyiragongo volcano, Virunga volcanic field, daniel P. Miggins, Charles D. Blome, and David V. Smith. Preliminary Argon40/Argon39 geochronology of igneous intrusions from Uvalde County, Texas, U. S. Geological Survey Open-File Report 2004-1031. In usgs. gov Chisholm, Hugh, ed. nephelinites, nefelinita in - Atlas de rocas ígneas
24.
Phonolite
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Phonolite is an uncommon extrusive igneous rock, volcanic rock, of intermediate chemical composition between felsic and mafic, with texture ranging from aphanitic to porphyritic. The name phonolite comes from the Ancient Greek meaning sounding stone because of the sound it produces if an unfractured plate is hit. Melting of such rocks to a low degree promotes the liberation of aluminium, potassium, sodium and calcium via melting of feldspar. Because the rock is silica undersaturated, it has no quartz or other silica crystals, a few geological processes and tectonic events can melt the necessary precursor rocks to form phonolite. These include intracontinental hotspot volcanism, such as may form above mantle plumes covered by continental crust. A-type granites and alkaline igneous provinces usually occur alongside phonolites, low-degree partial melting of underplates of granitic material in collisional orogenic belts may also produce phonolites. Phonolite is an equivalent of nepheline syenite. They are products of partial melting, are silica undersaturated, and have feldspathoids in their normative mineralogy, mineral assemblages in phonolite occurrences are usually abundant feldspathoids and alkali feldspar, and rare sodic plagioclase. Biotite, sodium-rich amphiboles and pyroxenes along with iron-rich olivine are common minor minerals, accessory phases include titanite, apatite, corundum, zircon, magnetite and ilmenite. Nepheline-normative rocks occur in association with the Bushveld Igneous Complex. Phonolite occurs in the related Pilanesberg Complex and Pienaars River Complex, phonolite tuff was used as a source of flint for adze heads and such by prehistoric man from Hohentwiel and Hegau, Germany. Phonolites can be separated into slabs of appropriate dimensions to be used as roofing tiles in place of roofing slate, one such occurrence is in the French Massif Central region such as the Haute Loire département. Alkaline rocks and carbonatites of the world
25.
Endemism
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The extreme opposite of endemism is cosmopolitan distribution. An alternative term for a species that is endemic is precinctive, the word endemic is from New Latin endēmicus, from Greek ενδήμος, endēmos, native. Endēmos is formed of en meaning in, and dēmos meaning the people, the term, precinctive, has been suggested by some scientists, and was first used in botany by MacCaughey in 1917. It is the equivalent of endemism, precinction was perhaps first used by Frank and McCoy. That definition excludes artificial confinement of examples by humans in far-off botanical gardens or zoological parks, physical, climatic, and biological factors can contribute to endemism. The orange-breasted sunbird is found in the fynbos vegetation zone of southwestern South Africa. The glacier bear is found only in limited places in Southeast Alaska, political factors can play a part if a species is protected, or actively hunted, in one jurisdiction but not another. There are two subcategories of endemism, paleoendemism and neoendemism, paleoendemism refers to species that were formerly widespread but are now restricted to a smaller area. Neoendemism refers to species that have arisen, such as through divergence and reproductive isolation or through hybridization. Endemics can easily become endangered or extinct if their restricted habitat changes, particularly—but not only—due to human actions, there were millions of both Bermuda petrels and Bermuda cedars in Bermuda when it was settled at the start of the seventeenth century. By the end of the century, the petrels were thought extinct, cedars, already ravaged by centuries of shipbuilding, were driven nearly to extinction in the twentieth century by the introduction of a parasite. Bermuda petrels and cedars are now rare, as are species endemic to Bermuda
26.
Capparis
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Capparis is also a family name, see e. g. Melpomene Capparis. Capparis is a plant genus in the family Capparaceae which is included in the Brassicaceae in the unrevised APG II system. These plants are shrubs or lianas and are known as caper shrubs or caperbushes. Capparis species occur over a range of habitat in the subtropical and tropical zones. Caperbushes are mainly used by humans for their fruit, which are rich in micronutrients, C. spinosa, simply known as caper, yields fruit and more importantly flower buds, which are widely used pickled as a vegetable condiment. The fruit of species, such as karir, are also used for cooking, C. mitchellii. Mabinlang seeds are eaten as sweets, Mabinlang is also used in Traditional Chinese Medicine. Aspalathos, the root of a shrub contained for example in the sacred Ancient Egyptian incense kp. t, is considered to be C. spinosa. Other species have also recorded uses in herbalism and folk medicine, mabinlins are sweet-tasting proteins found in Mabinlang seed, at least one of them is highly resistant to heat. The market for mabinlins is not large, but this is due to insufficient supply rather than to lack of demand. Caperbushes from arid regions - chiefly C. decidua - are highly useful in landscape gardening and they can stop soil erosion and preserve agricultural land. Any large-flowered species can be used to attract butterflies, the Crimson Rose, a spectacular swallowtail butterfly of South Asia, likes to visit flowers of C. spinosa in the winter months for example. The fruit and seeds of caperbushes are relished by many birds, some species of Capparis are becoming rare, mainly due to habitat destruction, and a few are seriously threatened with extinction. Capparis acutifolia Sweet Capparis arborea Maiden – Brush Caper Capparis baducca L. Capparis canescens Capparis crotonantha Standl, Capparis cynophallophora L. – Jamaican Caper Capparis decidua Edgew. – karir Capparis discolor J. D. Smith Capparis elegans Mart, Capparis fascicularis var. fascicularis Capparis frondosa Jacq. Capparis grandis Capparis heyneana Capparis humistrata F. Muell, Capparis indica Druce Capparis incana Kunth – Hoary Caper Capparis lasiantha R. Br. Capparis loranthifolia narrow-leaf bumble-tree Capparis lucida R. Br, – wild orange, merne atwakeye Capparis mollicella Standl. Capparis pachyphylla Jacobs Capparis panamensis Iltis Capparis prisca J. F. Macbr, Capparis pyrifolia – Pea-leaved Caper Capparis radula Gagnep
27.
Cayaponia
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Cayaponia is the largest genus in the gourd family Cucurbitaceae, with about 60 species. The plants are referred to as melonleaf and they are common from the southern United States to South America. Some species are found in western Africa, Madagascar, and Fernando de Noronha. It is native the southern United States to central South America, most species are found in rainforests and have white or yellow-green flowers. The original Cayaponia were pollinated by bats, but at least two shifts to bee pollination have occurred among some of its species and this is apparently the first clade to shift from bat to bee pollination vice bee to bat pollination. A2011 study based on genetics placed the genus Selysia under this genus, brazilian botanist António Luiz Patricio da Silva Manso named this genus after the indigenous Cayapo people of Brazil
28.
Cereus (plant)
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Cereus is a genus of cacti including around 33 species of large columnar cacti from South America. The name is derived from Greek and Latin words meaning wax or torch, the genus Cereus was one of the first cactus genera to be described, the circumscription varies depending on the authority. The term cereus is sometimes used for a ceroid cactus, any cactus with a very elongated body, including columnar growth cacti. Cereus are shrubby or treelike, often attaining great heights, most stems are angled or distinctly ribbed, ribs 3–14, usually well developed and have large areoles, usually bearing spines. Cephalium is not present, Cereus mortensenii develops pseudocephalium, flowers are large, funnelform, 9–30 cm long, usually white, sometimes pink, purple, rarely cream, yellow, greenish, and open at night. Fruits are globose to ovoid to oblong, 3–13 cm long, fleshy, naked, usually red but sometimes yellow, pulp white, seeds large, curved ovoid, glossy black. The name Cereus originates in a book by Tabernaemontanus published in 1625, regularly having been described by Philip Miller in 1754, and included all known cacti with very elongated bodies. Ludwig Pfeiffer in 1838 divided Cephalocereus, the name is derived from the Greek cephale, head, thus headed cereus, charles Lemaire described Pilocereus in 1839, now is renamed as Pilosocereus. The name Pilocereus is derived from the Greek pilos, felted, hairy, thus hairy cereus, similar to the Latin pilosus, echinocereus was described in 1848 by George Engelmann, the name is derived from the Greek echinos, hedgehog or sea urchin. Britton & Rose and Alwin Berger continued to divide Cereus into many genera and this inclusion-by-lack-of-exclusion makes for a very messy and unsatisfactory grouping. Anderson 2005 Subgenus Cereus Cereus argentinensis Cereus bicolor Cereus braunii Cereus cochabambensis Cereus comarapanus Cereus fernambucensis Cereus fernambucensis subsp, sericifer Cereus hankeanus Cereus hexagonus Cereus hildmannianus Cereus hildmannianus subsp. Uruguayanus Cereus insularis Cereus jamacaru Cereus jamacaru subsp, goiasensis Cereus lamprospermus Cereus lamprospermus subsp. Fruits and stems of Cereus repandus are edible and its wood has been used in making furniture and for firewood, and sliced stems have been used as a soap substitute. It is cultivated as a fence also. Columnar cacti – Cereus Cactiguide Cereus
29.
Palicourea
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Palicourea is a plant genus in the family Rubiaceae. It contains about 200 species, which range in habit from shrubs to small trees and these plants are very closely related to Psychotria and in particular its subgenus Heteropsychotria. Indeed, it seems to be nothing else but an offshoot of Heteropsychotria, arguably. The genus is not well studied, most species are distylous, although a few on isolated Caribbean islands seem to have lost the trait. Flowers are in racemes, having no scent, and are pollinated by hummingbirds. Blue-black berries follow, and are thought to be distributed by birds, almost one-tenth of the Palicourea species are considered threatened by the IUCN, even though the conservation status has only been reviewed for those species that occur in Ecuador
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Guettarda
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Guettarda is a plant genus in the family Rubiaceae. Most of these plants are known by the common name Velvetseed, estimates of the number of species range from about 50 to 162. Most of the species are neotropical, twenty are found in New Caledonia and one reaches Australia. A few others are found on islands and in areas of the Indian. Three species are known in cultivation, the type species for the genus is Guettarda speciosa. It is a tree of coastal habitats, up to 18 m in height and it is grown as an ornamental. Guettarda was named by Linnaeus in 1753 in his book Species Plantarum and this generic name is in honour of the 18th century French naturalist Jean-Étienne Guettard. The genus Guettarda is much in need of revision, molecular phylogenetic studies have found it to be several times polyphyletic with some of its clades paraphyletic over small genera. The following species list may be incomplete or contain synonyms
31.
Sideroxylon
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Sideroxylon is a genus of trees in the family Sapotaceae described as a genus by Linnaeus in 1753. They are collectively known as bully trees, the generic name is derived from the Greek words σιδηρος, meaning iron, and ξύλον, meaning wood. The genus is distributed mainly in North and South America, but also in Africa, Madagascar, southern Asia, some species, such as gum bully, S. tenax, and buckthorn bully, are found in subtropical areas of North America. The only South African species, the white milkwood, is associated with three sites, and these individuals were declared national monuments due to their unusual longevity. Several species have become rare due to logging and other forms of habitat destruction, accepted Species Argania spinosa Skeels Micropholis acutangula Eyma Micropholis crassipedicellata Pierre Micropholis guyanensis Pierre Micropholis rugosa Pierre Olinia ventosa Cufod
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Physalis
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Physalis is a genus of flowering plants in the nightshade family, which grow in warm temperate and subtropical regions of the world. Most of the species, of which there may be 75-90, are indigenous to the New World, cultivated species and weedy annuals have been introduced worldwide. A notable feature is the formation of a large papery husk derived from the calyx, the fruit is small and orange, similar in size, shape and structure to a small tomato. At least 46 species are endemic to the country of Mexico, many Physalis species are called groundcherries. One name for Physalis peruviana is Inca berry, another is Cape gooseberry, not to be confused with the true gooseberries, other names used to refer to the fruit are poha berries, and simply golden berries. Physalis are herbaceous plants growing to 0.4 to 3 m tall, similar to the tomato, a plant of the same family. They can be annual or perennial. Most require full sun and fairly warm to hot temperatures, some species are sensitive to frost, but others, such as the Chinese lantern, P. alkekengi, tolerate severe cold when dormant in winter. These plants grow in most soil types and do well in poor soils. Plants are susceptible to many of the common diseases and pests, and other pests such as aphids, whiteflies, spider mites. Some species are self-incompatible and require pollen from plants to bear fruit. Not all Physalis species bear edible fruit, select species are cultivated for their edible fruit, however, the typical Physalis fruit is similar to a firm tomato in texture, and like strawberries or pineapple in flavor, with a mild acidity. Some species, such as the Cape gooseberry and tomatillo have been bred into many cultivars with varying flavors, Physalis fruit are rich in cryptoxanthin. The fruit can be used like the tomato. Once extracted from its husk, it can be eaten raw, some varieties are added to desserts, used as flavoring, made into fruit preserves, or dried and used like raisins. They contain pectin and can be used in pie filling, the Cape gooseberry is native to the Americas, but is common in many subtropical areas. Its use in South Africa near the Cape of Good Hope inspired its common name, other species of commercial importance include the tomatillo. Some nations, such as Colombia, have a significant economic trade in Physalis fruit, some species are grown as ornamental plants. For example, the hardy Physalis alkekengi has edible small fruits but is most popular for its large, in Chinese medicine, Physalis species are used as to treat such conditions as abscesses, coughs, fevers, and sore throat
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Eared dove
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The eared dove is a New World dove. It is a resident breeder throughout South America from Colombia to southern Argentina and Chile and it may be a relatively recent colonist of Tobago and Trinidad. It appears to be migratory, its movements driven by food supplies. It is a relative of the North American mourning dove. With that species, the Socorro dove, and possibly the Galápagos dove it forms a superspecies, the latter two are insular offshoots, the Socorro birds from ancestral mourning doves, the Galápagos ones from more ancient stock. The eared dove is 24 cm long with a long wedge-shaped tail, adult males have mainly olive-brown upperpart plumage, with black spots on the wings. The head has a crown, black line behind the eye. These black markings give the species its English and specific name, the underparts are vinous, and the tail is tipped with cinnamon. The bill is black and the dark red. The female is duller than the male, and immature birds are greyish-brown, very dull, the species call is a deep soft oo-ah-oo. Eared doves feed mainly on seed taken from the ground, and this is a gregarious bird when not feeding, and forms flocks especially at migration time or at communal roosts. Its flight is high, fast and direct, with the regular beats and it also has a breeding display with a steep climb and semi-circular glide down to its original perch. It builds a stick nest several meters up in a tree. These hatch in 12–14 days with another 9 days to fledging, there appears to be no fixed breeding season in most of their range, and provided with plentiful food and habitat birds will breed almost continuously. Eared doves provide the last big-bag shooting experience in the world, there are reckoned to be more than 23 million of these doves in the fields around Córdoba in northern Argentina, and recent estimates put the figure in the 32 million range. It is not unknown for a gun to shoot 1000 birds in a day. The scale of this wing-shooting recalls the numbers of passenger pigeons taken by North American gunners in the 1800s and that hunting pressure brought the passenger pigeon to rapid extinction, but the eared dove seems to be more resilient. Indeed, as with the passenger pigeons, eared dove populations in Argentina, there are dozens of luxury lodges which specialize in dove hunting, and the season extends all year long
34.
Rail (bird)
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The rails, or Rallidae, are a large cosmopolitan family of small- to medium-sized ground-living birds. The family exhibits considerable diversity and also includes the crakes, coots, many species are associated with wetlands, although the family is found in every terrestrial habitat except dry deserts, polar regions, and alpine areas above the snow line. Members of the Rallidae occur on every continent except Antarctica, the most common rail habitats are marshland or dense forest. They are especially fond of dense vegetation, the rails are a fairly homogeneous family of small to medium-sized, ground-living birds. They vary in length from 12 cm to 63 cm and in weight from 20 g to 3000 g, some species have long necks and in many cases are laterally compressed. The bill is the most variable feature within the family, in some species it is longer than the head, in others it may be short and wide, or massive. A few coots and gallinules have a shield, which is a fleshy. The most complex frontal shield is found in the horned coot, Rails exhibit very little sexual dimorphism in either plumage or size. The wings of all rails are short and rounded, the flight of those Rallidae able to fly, while not powerful, can be sustained for long periods of time, and many species migrate annually. The weakness of their flight, however, means they are blown off course and thus are common vagrants. Furthermore, these birds prefer to run rather than fly, especially in dense habitat. Some are also flightless at some time during their moult period, Flightlessness in rails is one of the best examples of parallel evolution in the animal kingdom. Of the ~150 historically known rail species,31 extant or recently extinct species evolved flightlessness from volant ancestors and this process created the endemic populations of flightless rails that we see on Pacific islands today. Many island rails are flightless because small island habitats without mammalian predators eliminate the need to fly or move long distances, flight makes intense demands, with the keel and flight muscles taking up to a quarter of a birds weight in flying Rallidae species. Reducing the flight muscles, with a lowering of metabolic demands. For this reason, flightlessness makes it easier to survive and colonize an island where resources may be limited and this also allows for the evolution of multiple sizes of flightless rails on the same island as the birds diversify to find niches. In addition to conservation, certain morphological traits also affect rail evolution. Indeed, some argue that it might be possible to measure the evolution of flightlessness in rails in generations rather than millennia and it is paradoxical, since rails appear loath to fly, that the evolution of flightless rails would necessitate high dispersal to isolated islands
35.
Sigmodontinae
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The rodent subfamily Sigmodontinae is one of the most diverse groups of mammals. It includes New World rats and mice, with at least 376 species, many authorities include the Neotominae and Tylomyinae as part of a larger definition of Sigmodontinae. When those genera are included, the count numbers at least 508. Their distribution includes much of the New World, but the genera are predominantly South American and they invaded South America from Central America as part of the Great American Interchange near the end of the Miocene, about 5 million years ago. Sigmodontines proceeded to diversify explosively in the formerly isolated continent and they inhabit many of the same ecological niches that the Murinae occupy in the Old World. The Thomasomyini from the Atlantic Forest of Brazil are generally thought to be not especially related to the real Thomasomyini from the northern Andes and the Amazon rainforest. The genera Wiedomys and Sigmodon are generally placed in their own tribe, and the phyllotines Irenomys, Punomys, Euneomys, the name Sigmodontinae is based on the name of the type genus, Sigmodon. This name in turn derives from the Greek roots for S-tooth for the characteristic of the molars having an S-shape when viewed from above, luna, L. González, E. M. Patterson, B. D. On the Sigmodontinae radiation, An appraisal of the position of Rhagomys. Steppan, Scott J. Sigmodontinae, Neotropical mice and rats, data related to Sigmodontinae at Wikispecies
36.
Noronhomys
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Noronhomys vespuccii, also known as Vespuccis rodent, is an extinct rat species from the islands of Fernando de Noronha off northeastern Brazil. Numerous but fragmentary remains of the animal, of uncertain but probably Holocene age, were discovered in 1973. Noronhomys vespuccii was a large rodent, larger than the black rat. Although a suite of traits suggest that Holochilus is its closest relative, it is distinctive in many ways and is classified in a separate genus. On this island, identified as Fernando de Noronha, he saw very big rats, the Lettera purports to be an account of Vespuccis voyages, but it is unlikely that he produced it himself and, additionally, his fourth voyage may never have actually taken place. The lizard is probably Trachylepis atlantica and the record of snakes most likely refers to Amphisbaena ridleyi, the generic name, Noronhomys, combines the name of the island of Fernando de Noronha with the Ancient Greek μῦς mys mouse and the specific name, vespuccii, honors Amerigo Vespucci. Noronhomys would have larger than the black rat, which was common on ships. Oryzomyini is one of several tribes recognized within the subfamily Sigmodontinae, Sigmodontinae itself is the largest subfamily of the family Cricetidae, other members of which include voles, lemmings, hamsters, and deermice, all mainly from Eurasia and North America. They used an analysis to examine its relationships within Oryzomyini. They found that Noronhomys appeared closest to Holochilus, with Lundomys more distantly related, eighteen shared characters supported the grouping of Noronhomys with Holochilus. Another form described as a species of Holochilus, Holochilus primigenus, may also be related, in 1998, a fragmentary fossil of another species of this same group of oryzomyines was found in eastern Argentina. Noronhomys vespuccii is known from a number of fragments, including five skulls, damaged to various degrees. This material documents that, with a skull of about 4 cm, Noronhomys was a large oryzomyine, smaller than Lundomys. Skull shape is different from both Holochilus and Lundomys, resulting in a clear separation from both of these taxa in statistical analyses of measurement data. In three individuals measured, the length, a measure of skull length, varies from 38.0 to 39.2 mm. The width of the braincase is 13.4 to 14.8 mm, between the first molars, the width of the palate is 8.1 to 8.9 mm in four specimens, averaging 8.4 mm. The lower molars have a length of 7.57 to 8.29 mm, averaging 8.00 mm. The skull is flattened in general shape, the front part is short and broad
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Amphisbaena ridleyi
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Amphisbaena ridleyi, known by the common names Ridleys worm lizard or the Noronha worm lizard, is a species of amphisbaenian in the genus Amphisbaena. This species is endemic to the island of Fernando de Noronha off the coast of Brazil and it is one of two indigenous reptiles on the island. Italian explorer Amerigo Vespucci may have visited Fernando de Noronha in 1503, in an account of his voyage, the authenticity of which is doubtful, he records some snakes from the island. Although Amphisbaena ridleyi is not a snake, the difference would be only to a herpetologist. He also recorded lizards with two tails and very big rats, which can be identified with Trachylepis atlantica and Noronhomys vespuccii, the generic name Amphisbaena is a compound of two Greek words, αμφις, meaning both ways, and βαινειν, meaning to go. This is in reference to the appearance of having a head on either end of its body, in 1945, a Lt. Finley acquired five individuals and in 1973, ornithologist Storrs L. Olson collected 12 additional examples, which are now in the United States National Museum. This amphisbaenian is found on the island of Fernando de Noronha and it is common in suitable habitat, Olson reported that it could easily be found in forests by turning over stones. Malathronas mentions that they can be seen basking in the sun on Morro de Pico, despite a superficial resemblance to primitive snakes, amphisbaenians such as Amphisbaena ridleyi have features which distinguish them from other reptiles. Internally, their right lung is reduced in size to fit their bodies, whereas in snakes. The typical length for this species is 250 millimetres, Amphisbaena ridleyi has a stout head with a broad snout, not set off from the neck. Most of the skull is solid bone, and they have a single median tooth in the upper jaw. They have no ears, and the eyes are deeply recessed and covered with skin. The body is elongated, and the tail truncates in a manner that resembles the head. They lack legs but have remnants of the pelvic and pectoral girdles embedded within their body musculature and their tail is only loosely attached to their bodies, and they move using an accordion-like motion, in which the skin moves and the body seemingly just drags along behind it. They are also able to perform this locomotion in reverse. Amphisbaena ridleyi is carnivorous, and has blunt, interlocking, teeth, meant for crushing their prey, primarily snails and it is the only amphisbaenian known to have specializations for eating hard food such as snails. In periods of drought Amphisbaena ridleyi climbs the trunks of Mulungu trees to obtain nectar from the flowers, list of reptiles of Brazil Boulenger, G. A. Notes on the Zoology of Fernando Noronha, data related to Amphisbaena ridleyi at Wikispecies
38.
Noronha skink
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The Noronha skink is a species of skink from the island of Fernando de Noronha off northeastern Brazil. It is covered with dark and light spots on the upperparts and is usually about 7 to 10 cm in length, the tail is long and muscular, but breaks off easily. Introduced predators such as feral cats prey on it and several parasitic worms infect it, perhaps seen by Amerigo Vespucci in 1503, it was first formally described in 1839. Its subsequent taxonomic history has been complex, riddled with confusion with Trachylepis maculata and other species, homonyms, the species is classified in the otherwise mostly African genus Trachylepis and is thought to have reached its island from Africa by rafting. The enigmatic Trachylepis tschudii, supposedly from Peru, may well be the same species, the tail is long and fragile, and it breaks easily, like that of many skinks and other lizards, following which it may regenerate. However, when it does not completely break off, a new tail may grow out of the broken part. The species was first formally described by John Edward Gray in 1839 and he introduced the names Tiliqua punctata, for the Noronha skink, and Tiliqua maculata, for a species from Guyana, among many others. Six years later, he transferred both to the genus Euprepis and he also included Mabouya punctatissima OShaughnessy,1874, purportedly from South Africa, as a synonym. In 1900, L. G. Andersson claimed that Grays name punctata was preoccupied by Lacerta punctata Linnaeus,1758 and he therefore replaced the name punctata with its junior synonym maculata, using the name Mabuya maculata for the skink of Fernando de Noronha. Linnaeuss Lacerta punctata in fact refers to the Asian species Lygosoma punctatum, not to Mabuya homalocephala and he wrote that the Noronha skink was very distinct from other American Mabuya and more similar in some respects to African species. He also considered Mabouya punctatissima and Trachylepis punctata Tschudi,1845, described from Peru, in 1948, he acknowledged the preoccupation of punctata noted by Andersson and accordingly retired Mabuya punctata in favor of Mabuya maculata, as Andersson had done. The name Mabuya maculata remained in usage for the Noronha skink in subsequent decades, though some have used Mabuya punctata. Aware of the last nomenclatural changes and they split the old genus Mabuya into four genera for geographically discrete clades, including Euprepis for the African–Noronha clade, thus renaming the Noronha species to Euprepis atlanticus. Bauer found that the name Euprepis had been applied to this clade. Additional molecular phylogenetic studies published in 2003 and 2006 confirmed the relationship between the Noronha skink and African Trachylepis and they also reviewed Trachylepis punctata and replaced it with Trachylepis tschudii because the older name was preoccupied by Linnaeuss and Grays punctata. Although they were unable to resolve the identity of T, the Noronha skink is covered with light and dark spots above, but there is substantial variation in the precise colors. The scales on the underparts are yellowish or grayish, the eyelids are white to yellow. It has a head with small nostrils, which are placed far to the front at the sides of the head
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Sea turtle
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Sea turtles, sometimes called marine turtles, are reptiles of the order Testudines. The seven extant species of sea turtles are, the green, loggerhead, Kemps ridley, olive ridley, hawksbill, flatback, the majority of a sea turtles body is protected by its shell. The turtles shell is divided two sections, carapace and plastron. The shell is made up of plates called scutes. The leatherback is the sea turtle that does not have a hard shell. Instead, it bears a mosaic of bony plates beneath its leathery skin, in general, sea turtles have a more fusiform body plan than their terrestrial or freshwater counterparts. The reduced volume of a body means sea turtles can not retract their head, legs. However this more stream-line body plan reduces drag in the water, the leatherback is the largest species of sea turtle. Measuring 2-3 meters in length, and 1-1.5 m in width, other species are smaller, being mostly 60-120 cm and proportionally narrower. Sea turtles, along with turtles and tortoises, are part of the order Testudines. All species except the leatherback are in the family Cheloniidae, the leatherback is the only extant member of the family Dermochelyidae. The origin of sea turtles back to the Late Jurassic with genera such as Plesiochelys. In Africa, the first marine turtle is Angolachelys, from the Turonian of Angola, however, neither of these are related to extant sea turtles, the oldest representative of the lineage leading to these was Desmatochelys padillai, from the Early Cretaceous. A lineage of unrelated marine testudines, the pleurodire bothremydids, also survived well into the Cenozoic, Sea turtles constitute a single radiation that became distinct from all other turtles at least 110 million years ago. The flatback sea turtle is found solely on the northern coast of Australia, the Kemps ridley sea turtle is found solely in the Gulf of Mexico and along the East Coast of the United States. Sea turtles are found in the waters over continental shelves. During the first three to five years of life, sea turtles spend most of their time in the pelagic zone floating in seaweed mats, Green sea turtles in particular are often found in Sargassum mats, in which they find shelter and food. Once the sea turtle has reached adulthood it moves closer to the shore, females will come ashore to lay their eggs on sandy beaches during the nesting season
40.
Cetacea
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Cetacea are a widely distributed and diverse clade of aquatic mammals that today consists of the whales, dolphins, and porpoises. Most species live in the sea, some in rivers, the name is derived from the Latin cetus whale and Greek ketos huge fish. The extinct ancestors of modern whales are the Archaeoceti, while cetaceans were historically thought to have descended from mesonychids, molecular evidence supports them as a relative of Artiodactyls. Cetaceans belong to the order Cetartiodactyla and their closest living relatives are hippopotamuses and other hoofed mammals, having diverged about 50 million years ago. Cetaceans range in size from the 1 m and 50 kg Mauis dolphin to the 29.9 m and 190,000 kg blue whale and they have streamlined bodies and two limbs that are modified into flippers. Dolphins are able to very tight turns while swimming at high speeds. The hindlimbs of cetaceans are internal, and are thought to be vestigial, baleen whales have short hairs on their mouth, unlike the toothed whales. Cetaceans have well-developed senses—their eyesight and hearing are adapted for both air and water, and baleen whales have a system in their vibrissae. They have a layer of fat, or blubber, under the skin to maintain body heat in cold water, Some species are well adapted for diving to great depths. Although cetaceans are widespread, most species prefer the waters of the Northern and Southern Hemispheres. They spend their lives in the water, having to mate, give birth, molt or escape predators, like killer whales. This has drastically affected their anatomy to be able to do so and they feed largely on fish and marine invertebrates, but a few, like the killer whale, feed on large mammals and birds, such as penguins and seals. Some baleen whales are specialised for feeding on benthic creatures, male cetaceans typically mate with more than one female, although the degree of polygyny varies with the species. Cetaceans are not shown to have pair bonds, male cetacean strategies for reproductive success vary between herding females, defending potential mates from other males, or whale song which attracts mates. Calves are typically born in the fall and winter months, cetaceans produce a number of vocalizations, notably the clicks and whistles of dolphins, the moaning songs of the humpback whale. The meat, blubber and oil of cetaceans have traditionally used by indigenous peoples of the Arctic. Cetaceans have been depicted in cultures worldwide. Dolphins are commonly kept in captivity and are sometimes trained to perform tricks and tasks
41.
Spinner dolphin
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The spinner dolphin is a small dolphin found in off-shore tropical waters around the world. It is famous for its displays in which it spins along its longitudinal axis as it leaps through the air. It is a member of the family Delphinidae of toothed whales, the species was described by John Gray in 1828. The four named subspecies are, Eastern spinner dolphin, from the tropical eastern Pacific, central American or Costa Rican spinner dolphin, also found in the tropical eastern Pacific. Grays or Hawaiian spinner dolphin, from the central Pacific Ocean around Hawaii, dwarf spinner dolphin, first found in the Gulf of Thailand. The species, though, displays greater variety than these subspecies might indicate, a hybrid form characterized by its white belly inhabits the eastern Pacific. Other less distinct groupings inhabit other oceans, the species name comes from the Latin term for long-beaked. Spinner dolphins are small cetaceans with a slim build, adults are typically 129–235 cm long and reach a body mass of 23–79 kg. This species has a rostrum and a triangular or subtriangular dorsal fin. Spinner dolphins generally have tripartite color patterns, the dorsal area is dark gray, the sides light gray, and the underside pale gray or white. Also, a dark band runs from the eye to the flipper, bordered above by a thin, however, the spinner dolphin has more geographic variation in form and coloration than other cetaceans. In the open waters of eastern Pacific, dolphins have relatively small skulls with short rostra, a dwarf form of spinner dolphin occurs around southeast Asia. In these same subspecies, a dorsal cape dims their tripartite color patterns. Further offshore, subspecies tend to have a paler and less far-reaching cape, in certain subspecies, some males may have upright fins that slant forward. Some populations of spinner dolphin found in the eastern Pacific have bizarre backwards-facing dorsal fins, the spinner dolphin lives in nearly all tropical and subtropical waters between 40°N and 40°S. The species primarily inhabits coastal waters, islands, or banks, however, in the eastern tropical Pacific, dolphins live far from shore. Spinner dolphins may use different habitats depending on the season, the spinner dolphin feeds mainly on small mesopelagic fish, squids, and sergestid shrimps, and will dive 200–300 m to feed on them. Spinner dolphins of Hawaii are nocturnal feeders and forage in deep scattering layers, the dwarf spinner dolphin may feed mostly on benthic fish in reefs and shallow water
42.
Humpback whale
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The humpback whale is a species of baleen whale. One of the larger species, adults range in length from 12–16 m. The humpback has a body shape, with long pectoral fins. It is known for breaching and other distinctive surface behaviors, making it popular with whale watchers, males produce a complex song lasting 10 to 20 minutes, which they repeat for hours at a time. Its purpose is not clear, though it may have a role in mating, found in oceans and seas around the world, humpback whales typically migrate up to 25,000 km each year. Humpbacks feed in polar waters, and migrate to tropical or subtropical waters to breed and give birth when they fast and their diet consists mostly of krill and small fish. Humpbacks have a repertoire of feeding methods, including the bubble net technique. Like other large whales, the humpback was a target for the whaling industry, once hunted to the brink of extinction, its population fell by an estimated 90% before a 1966 moratorium. While stocks have partially recovered, entanglement in fishing gear, collisions with ships, the rorquals are believed to have diverged from the other families of the suborder Mysticeti as long ago as the middle Miocene. However, it is not known when the members of these families diverged from each other, though clearly related to the giant whales of the genus Balaenoptera, the humpback is the sole member of its genus. The humpback was first identified as de la Nouvelle Angleterre by Mathurin Jacques Brisson in his Regnum Animale of 1756. In 1781, Georg Heinrich Borowski described the species, converting Brissons name to its Latin equivalent, in 1804, Lacépède shifted the humpback from the family Balaenidae, renaming it B. jubartes. In 1846, John Edward Gray created the genus Megaptera, classifying the humpback as Megaptera longipinna, the common name is derived from the curving of their backs when diving. The generic name Megaptera from the Greek mega-/μεγα- giant and ptera/πτερα wing, the specific name means New Englander and was probably given by Brisson due to regular sightings of humpbacks off the coast of New England. Some biologists believe that these should be regarded as separate subspecies, humpbacks can easily be identified by their stocky body, obvious hump, black dorsal coloring and elongated pectoral fins. The head and lower jaw are covered with knobs called tubercles, the fluked tail, which typically rises above the surface when diving, has wavy trailing edges. Humpbacks have 270 to 400 darkly colored baleen plates on each side of their mouths, the plates measure from 18 in in the front to about 3 ft in the back, behind the hinge. Ventral grooves run from the jaw to the umbilicus, about halfway along the underside of the body
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