1.
North Sea
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The North Sea is a marginal sea of the Atlantic Ocean located between Great Britain, Scandinavia, Germany, the Netherlands, Belgium, and France. An epeiric sea on the European continental shelf, it connects to the ocean through the English Channel in the south and it is more than 970 kilometres long and 580 kilometres wide, with an area of around 570,000 square kilometres. The North Sea has long been the site of important European shipping lanes as well as a major fishery, the North Sea was the centre of the Vikings rise. Subsequently, the Hanseatic League, the Netherlands, and the British each sought to dominate the North Sea and thus the access to the markets, as Germanys only outlet to the ocean, the North Sea continued to be strategically important through both World Wars. The coast of the North Sea presents a diversity of geological and geographical features, in the north, deep fjords and sheer cliffs mark the Norwegian and Scottish coastlines, whereas in the south it consists primarily of sandy beaches and wide mudflats. Due to the population, heavy industrialization, and intense use of the sea and area surrounding it. In the southwest, beyond the Straits of Dover, the North Sea becomes the English Channel connecting to the Atlantic Ocean, in the east, it connects to the Baltic Sea via the Skagerrak and Kattegat, narrow straits that separate Denmark from Norway and Sweden respectively. In the north it is bordered by the Shetland Islands, and connects with the Norwegian Sea, the North Sea is more than 970 kilometres long and 580 kilometres wide, with an area of 570,000 square kilometres and a volume of 54,000 cubic kilometres. Around the edges of the North Sea are sizeable islands and archipelagos, including Shetland, Orkney, the North Sea receives freshwater from a number of European continental watersheds, as well as the British Isles. A large part of the European drainage basin empties into the North Sea including water from the Baltic Sea, the largest and most important rivers flowing into the North Sea are the Elbe and the Rhine – Meuse watershed. Around 185 million people live in the catchment area of the rivers discharging into the North Sea encompassing some highly industrialized areas, for the most part, the sea lies on the European continental shelf with a mean depth of 90 metres. The only exception is the Norwegian trench, which extends parallel to the Norwegian shoreline from Oslo to a north of Bergen. It is between 20 and 30 kilometres wide and has a depth of 725 metres. The Dogger Bank, a vast moraine, or accumulation of unconsolidated glacial debris and this feature has produced the finest fishing location of the North Sea. The Long Forties and the Broad Fourteens are large areas with uniform depth in fathoms. These great banks and others make the North Sea particularly hazardous to navigate, the Devils Hole lies 200 miles east of Dundee, Scotland. The feature is a series of trenches between 20 and 30 kilometres long,1 and 2 kilometres wide and up to 230 metres deep. Other areas which are less deep are Cleaver Bank, Fisher Bank, the International Hydrographic Organization defines the limits of the North Sea as follows, On the Southwest
2.
Germany
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Germany, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a federal parliamentary republic in central-western Europe. It includes 16 constituent states, covers an area of 357,021 square kilometres, with about 82 million inhabitants, Germany is the most populous member state of the European Union. After the United States, it is the second most popular destination in the world. Germanys capital and largest metropolis is Berlin, while its largest conurbation is the Ruhr, other major cities include Hamburg, Munich, Cologne, Frankfurt, Stuttgart, Düsseldorf and Leipzig. Various Germanic tribes have inhabited the northern parts of modern Germany since classical antiquity, a region named Germania was documented before 100 AD. During the Migration Period the Germanic tribes expanded southward, beginning in the 10th century, German territories formed a central part of the Holy Roman Empire. During the 16th century, northern German regions became the centre of the Protestant Reformation, in 1871, Germany became a nation state when most of the German states unified into the Prussian-dominated German Empire. After World War I and the German Revolution of 1918–1919, the Empire was replaced by the parliamentary Weimar Republic, the establishment of the national socialist dictatorship in 1933 led to World War II and the Holocaust. After a period of Allied occupation, two German states were founded, the Federal Republic of Germany and the German Democratic Republic, in 1990, the country was reunified. In the 21st century, Germany is a power and has the worlds fourth-largest economy by nominal GDP. As a global leader in industrial and technological sectors, it is both the worlds third-largest exporter and importer of goods. Germany is a country with a very high standard of living sustained by a skilled. It upholds a social security and universal health system, environmental protection. Germany was a member of the European Economic Community in 1957. It is part of the Schengen Area, and became a co-founder of the Eurozone in 1999, Germany is a member of the United Nations, NATO, the G8, the G20, and the OECD. The national military expenditure is the 9th highest in the world, the English word Germany derives from the Latin Germania, which came into use after Julius Caesar adopted it for the peoples east of the Rhine. This in turn descends from Proto-Germanic *þiudiskaz popular, derived from *þeudō, descended from Proto-Indo-European *tewtéh₂- people, the discovery of the Mauer 1 mandible shows that ancient humans were present in Germany at least 600,000 years ago. The oldest complete hunting weapons found anywhere in the world were discovered in a mine in Schöningen where three 380, 000-year-old wooden javelins were unearthed
3.
Denmark
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The term Danish Realm refers to the relationship between Denmark proper, the Faroe Islands and Greenland—three countries constituting the Kingdom of Denmark. The legal nature of the Kingdom of Denmark is fundamentally one of a sovereign state. The Faroe Islands and Greenland have been part of the Crown of Denmark since 1397 when the Kalmar Union was ratified, legal matters in The Danish Realm are subject to the Danish Constitution. Beginning in 1953, state law issues within The Danish Realm has been governed by The Unity of the Realm, a less formal name for The Unity of the Realm is the Commonwealth of the Realm. In 1978, The Unity of The Realm was for the first time referred to as rigsfællesskabet. The name caught on and since the 1990s, both The Unity of The Realm and The Danish Realm itself has increasingly been referred to as simply rigsfællesskabet in daily parlance. The Danish Constitution stipulates that the foreign and security interests for all parts of the Danish Realm are the responsibility of the Danish government, the Faroes received home rule in 1948 and Greenland did so in 1979. In 2005, the Faroes received a self-government arrangement, and in 2009 Greenland received self rule, the Danish Realms unique state of internal affairs is acted out in the principle of The Unity of the Realm. This principle is derived from Article 1 of the Danish Constitution which specifies that constitutional law applies equally to all areas of the Danish Realm, the Constitutional Act specifies that sovereignty is to continue to be exclusively with the authorities of the Realm. The language of Denmark is Danish, and the Danish state authorities are based in Denmark, the Kingdom of Denmarks parliament, with its 179 members, is located in the capital, Copenhagen. Two of the members are elected in each of Greenland and the Faroe Islands. The Government ministries are located in Copenhagen, as is the highest court, in principle, the Danish Realm constitutes a unified sovereign state, with equal status between its constituent parts. Devolution differs from federalism in that the powers of the subnational authority ultimately reside in central government. The Self-Government Arrangements devolves political competence and responsibility from the Danish political authorities to the Faroese, the Faroese and Greenlandic authorities administer the tasks taken over from the state, enact legislation in these specific fields and have the economic responsibility for solving these tasks. The Danish government provides a grant to the Faroese and the Greenlandic authorities to cover the costs of these devolved areas. The 1948 Home Rule Act of the Faroe Islands sets out the terms of Faroese home rule, the Act states. the Faroe Islands shall constitute a self-governing community within the State of Denmark. It establishes the government of the Faroe Islands and the Faroese parliament. The Faroe Islands were previously administered as a Danish county, the Home Rule Act abolished the post of Amtmand and these powers were expanded in a 2005 Act, which named the Faroese home government as an equal partner with the Danish government
4.
Central Java
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Central Java is a province of Indonesia. This province is located in the middle of Java, the province is 32,800.69 km2 in area, approximately a quarter of the total land area of Java. Its population was 33,753,023 at the 2015 Census, Central Java is also a cultural concept that includes the Special Region and city of Yogyakarta as well as the Province of Central Java. However, administratively the city and its surrounding regencies have formed a special region since Indonesian independence. Located in the middle of the island of Java, the Central Java province is bordered by West Java, a small portion of its south region is the Yogyakarta Special Region province, fully enclosed on the landward side by the Central Java province. To the north and the south, the Central Java province faces the Java Sea, Central Java includes offshore islands such as Karimun Jawa Islands in the north, and Nusakambangan in the southwest. Yogyakarta is historically and culturally part of the Central Java region, the average temperature in Central Java is between 18–28 degrees Celsius and the relative humidity varies between 73–94 percent. While a high level of humidity exists in most low-lying parts of the province, the highest average annual rainfall of 3,990 mm with 195 rainy days was recorded in Salatiga. The geography of Central Java is regular with small strips of lowlands near the northern and southern coast with mountain ranges in the centre of the region, to the west lies an active stratovolcano Mount Slamet, and further east is the Dieng Volcanic Complex on Dieng Plateau. Southeast of Dieng lies the Kedu Plain, which is bordered to the east side by the volcanoes of Mount Merapi. South of Semarang, lies Mount Ungaran, and to the north-east of the city lies Mount Muria on the most northern tip of Java, to the east near the border with East Java lies Mount Lawu, where its eastern slopes are in the East Java province. Due to its volcanic history, volcanic ash makes Central Java highly fertile agriculture land. Paddy fields are extensive, except in the southeastern Gunung Kidul region partly due to the concentration of limestone. The largest rivers are the Serayu in the west, which empties into the Indian Ocean, on the eve of the World War II in 1942, Central Java was subdivided into 7 residencies which corresponded more or less with the main regions of this area. These residencies were Banjoemas, Kedoe, Pekalongan, Semarang, and Djapara-Rembang plus the so-called Gouvernement Soerakarta, however, after the local elections in 1957 the role of these residencies were reduced until they finally disappeared. Nowadays Central Java is divided into 29 regencies and 6 cities and these contemporary regencies and cities can further be subdivided into 565 districts. These districts are subdivided into 7,804 rural communes or villages and 764 urban communes. Java has been inhabited by humans or their ancestors since prehistoric times, in Central Java and the adjacent territories in East Java remains known as Java Man were discovered in the 1890s by the Dutch anatomist and geologist Eugène Dubois
5.
Java
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Java is an island of Indonesia. With a population of over 141 million or 145 million as of 2015 Census released in December 2015, the Indonesian capital city, Jakarta, is located on western Java. Much of Indonesian history took place on Java and it was the center of powerful Hindu-Buddhist empires, the Islamic sultanates, and the core of the colonial Dutch East Indies. Java was also the center of the Indonesian struggle for independence during the 1930s and 1940s, Java dominates Indonesia politically, economically and culturally. Formed mostly as the result of eruptions, Java is the 13th largest island in the world. A chain of mountains forms an east–west spine along the island. Three main languages are spoken on the island, Javanese, Sundanese, of these, Javanese is the dominant, it is the native language of about 60 million people in Indonesia, most of whom live on Java. Furthermore, most residents are bilingual, speaking Indonesian as their first or second language, while the majority of the people of Java are Muslim, Java has a diverse mixture of religious beliefs, ethnicities, and cultures. Java is divided into four provinces, West Java, Central Java, East Java, and Banten, the origins of the name Java are not clear. One possibility is that the island was named after the plant, which was said to be common in the island during the time. There are other sources, the word jaú and its variations mean beyond or distant. And, in Sanskrit yava means barley, a plant for which the island was famous, Yawadvipa is mentioned in Indias earliest epic, the Ramayana. Sugriva, the chief of Ramas army dispatched his men to Yawadvipa and it was hence referred to in India by the Sanskrit name yāvaka dvīpa. Java is mentioned in the ancient Tamil text Manimekalai by Chithalai Chathanar that states that Java had a kingdom with a capital called Nagapuram, another source states that the Java word is derived from a Proto-Austronesian root word, Iawa that meaning home. The great island of Iabadiu or Jabadiu was mentioned in Ptolemys Geographia composed around 150 CE Roman Empire, Iabadiu is said to mean barley island, to be rich in gold, and have a silver town called Argyra at the west end. The name indicate Java, and seems to be derived from Hindu name Java-dvipa, Java lies between Sumatra to the west and Bali to the east. Borneo lies to the north and Christmas Island is to the south and it is the worlds 13th largest island. Java is surrounded by the Java Sea to the north, Sunda Strait to the west, Java is almost entirely of volcanic origin, it contains thirty-eight mountains forming an east–west spine that have at one time or another been active volcanoes
6.
Venice
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Venice is a city in northeastern Italy and the capital of the Veneto region. It is situated across a group of 118 small islands that are separated by canals and these are located in the shallow Venetian Lagoon, an enclosed bay that lies between the mouths of the Po and the Piave Rivers. Parts of Venice are renowned for the beauty of their settings, their architecture, the lagoon and a part of the city are listed as a World Heritage Site. In 2014,264,579 people resided in Comune di Venezia, together with Padua and Treviso, the city is included in the Padua-Treviso-Venice Metropolitan Area, with a total population of 2.6 million. PATREVE is a metropolitan area without any degree of autonomy. The name is derived from the ancient Veneti people who inhabited the region by the 10th century BC, the city was historically the capital of the Republic of Venice. Venice has been known as the La Dominante, Serenissima, Queen of the Adriatic, City of Water, City of Masks, City of Bridges, The Floating City, and City of Canals. The City State of Venice is considered to have been the first real international financial center which gradually emerged from the 9th century to its peak in the 14th century and this made Venice a wealthy city throughout most of its history. It is also known for its several important artistic movements, especially the Renaissance period, Venice has played an important role in the history of symphonic and operatic music, and it is the birthplace of Antonio Vivaldi. Venice has been ranked the most beautiful city in the world as of 2016, the name Venetia, however, derives from the Roman name for the people known as the Veneti, and called by the Greeks Eneti. The meaning of the word is uncertain, although there are other Indo-European tribes with similar-sounding names, such as the Celtic Veneti, Baltic Veneti, and the Slavic Wends. Linguists suggest that the name is based on an Indo-European root *wen, so that *wenetoi would mean beloved, lovable, a connection with the Latin word venetus, meaning the color sea-blue, is also possible. The alternative obsolete form is Vinegia, some late Roman sources reveal the existence of fishermen on the islands in the original marshy lagoons. They were referred to as incolae lacunae, the traditional founding is identified with the dedication of the first church, that of San Giacomo on the islet of Rialto — said to have taken place at the stroke of noon on 25 March 421. Beginning as early as AD166 to 168, the Quadi and Marcomanni destroyed the center in the area. The Roman defences were again overthrown in the early 5th century by the Visigoths and, some 50 years later, New ports were built, including those at Malamocco and Torcello in the Venetian lagoon. The tribuni maiores, the earliest central standing governing committee of the islands in the Lagoon, the traditional first doge of Venice, Paolo Lucio Anafesto, was actually Exarch Paul, and his successor, Marcello Tegalliano, was Pauls magister militum. In 726 the soldiers and citizens of the Exarchate rose in a rebellion over the controversy at the urging of Pope Gregory II
7.
Italy
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Italy, officially the Italian Republic, is a unitary parliamentary republic in Europe. Located in the heart of the Mediterranean Sea, Italy shares open land borders with France, Switzerland, Austria, Slovenia, San Marino, Italy covers an area of 301,338 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate and Mediterranean climate. Due to its shape, it is referred to in Italy as lo Stivale. With 61 million inhabitants, it is the fourth most populous EU member state, the Italic tribe known as the Latins formed the Roman Kingdom, which eventually became a republic that conquered and assimilated other nearby civilisations. The legacy of the Roman Empire is widespread and can be observed in the distribution of civilian law, republican governments, Christianity. The Renaissance began in Italy and spread to the rest of Europe, bringing a renewed interest in humanism, science, exploration, Italian culture flourished at this time, producing famous scholars, artists and polymaths such as Leonardo da Vinci, Galileo, Michelangelo and Machiavelli. The weakened sovereigns soon fell victim to conquest by European powers such as France, Spain and Austria. Despite being one of the victors in World War I, Italy entered a period of economic crisis and social turmoil. The subsequent participation in World War II on the Axis side ended in defeat, economic destruction. Today, Italy has the third largest economy in the Eurozone and it has a very high level of human development and is ranked sixth in the world for life expectancy. The country plays a prominent role in regional and global economic, military, cultural and diplomatic affairs, as a reflection of its cultural wealth, Italy is home to 51 World Heritage Sites, the most in the world, and is the fifth most visited country. The assumptions on the etymology of the name Italia are very numerous, according to one of the more common explanations, the term Italia, from Latin, Italia, was borrowed through Greek from the Oscan Víteliú, meaning land of young cattle. The bull was a symbol of the southern Italic tribes and was often depicted goring the Roman wolf as a defiant symbol of free Italy during the Social War. Greek historian Dionysius of Halicarnassus states this account together with the legend that Italy was named after Italus, mentioned also by Aristotle and Thucydides. The name Italia originally applied only to a part of what is now Southern Italy – according to Antiochus of Syracuse, but by his time Oenotria and Italy had become synonymous, and the name also applied to most of Lucania as well. The Greeks gradually came to apply the name Italia to a larger region, excavations throughout Italy revealed a Neanderthal presence dating back to the Palaeolithic period, some 200,000 years ago, modern Humans arrived about 40,000 years ago. Other ancient Italian peoples of undetermined language families but of possible origins include the Rhaetian people and Cammuni. Also the Phoenicians established colonies on the coasts of Sardinia and Sicily, the Roman legacy has deeply influenced the Western civilisation, shaping most of the modern world
8.
Monsoon
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Usually, the term monsoon is used to refer to the rainy phase of a seasonally changing pattern, although technically there is also a dry phase. The term is sometimes used for locally heavy but short-term rains. The major monsoon systems of the world consist of the West African and Asia-Australian monsoons, the inclusion of the North and South American monsoons with incomplete wind reversal has been debated. The south-west monsoon winds are called Nairutya Maarut in India, the English monsoon came from Portuguese monção, ultimately from Arabic mawsim and/or Hindi mausam, perhaps partly via early modern Dutch monsun. Strengthening of the Asian monsoon has been linked to the uplift of the Tibetan Plateau after the collision of the Indian sub-continent and Asia around 50 million years ago. Because of studies of records from the Arabian Sea and that of the wind-blown dust in the Loess Plateau of China, testing of this hypothesis awaits deep ocean sampling by the Integrated Ocean Drilling Program. The monsoon has varied significantly in strength since this time, largely linked to climate change. A study of marine plankton suggested that the Indian Monsoon strengthened around 5 million years ago, then, during ice periods, the sea level fell and the Indonesian Seaway closed. When this happened, cold waters in the Pacific were impeded from flowing into the Indian Ocean and it is believed that the resulting increase in sea surface temperatures in the Indian Ocean increased the intensity of monsoons. Five episodes during the Quaternary at 2.22 Ma,1.83 Ma,0.68 Ma,0.45 Ma and 0.04 Ma were identified which showed a weakening of Leeuwin Current. The weakening of the LC would have an effect on the sea surface temperature field in the Indian Ocean, thus these five intervals could probably be those of considerable lowering of SST in the Indian Ocean and would have influenced Indian monsoon intensity. The impact of monsoon on the weather is different from place to place. In some places there is just a likelihood of having a more or less rain. In other places, quasi semi-deserts are turned into green grasslands where all sorts of plants. The Indian Monsoon turns large parts of India from a kind of semi-desert into green lands, see photos only taken 3 months apart in the Western Ghats. In places like this it is crucial for farmers to have the right timing for putting the seeds on the fields, Monsoons are large-scale sea breezes which occur when the temperature on land is significantly warmer or cooler than the temperature of the ocean. These temperature imbalances happen because oceans and land absorb heat in different ways, in contrast, dirt, sand, and rocks have lower heat capacities, and they can only transmit heat into the earth by conduction and not by convection. Therefore, bodies of water stay at an even temperature
9.
Darwin, Northern Territory
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Darwin /ˈdɑːrwᵻn/ is the capital city of the Northern Territory of Australia. Situated on the Timor Sea, Darwin is the largest city in the sparsely populated Northern Territory and it is the smallest and most northerly of the Australian capital cities, and acts as the Top Ends regional centre. Darwins proximity to South East Asia makes it a link between Australia and countries such as Indonesia and East Timor, the Stuart Highway begins in Darwin, ending at Port Augusta in South Australia. The city itself is built on a low bluff overlooking the harbour and its suburbs spread out over some area, beginning at Lee Point in the north and stretching to Berrimah in the east. Past Berrimah, the Stuart Highway goes on to Darwins satellite city, Palmerston, the Darwin region, like the rest of the Top End, has a tropical climate, with a wet and a dry season. Prone to cyclone activity during the wet season, Darwin experiences heavy monsoonal downpours, during the dry season, the city is met with blue skies and gentle sea breezes from the harbour. The greater Darwin area is the home of the Larrakia people. On 9 September 1839, HMS Beagle sailed into Darwin harbour during its surveying of the area, John Clements Wickham named the region Port Darwin in honour of their former shipmate Charles Darwin, who had sailed with them on the ships previous voyage which had ended in October 1836. The settlement there became the town of Palmerston in 1869, and was renamed Darwin in 1911. The city has been almost entirely rebuilt four times, following devastation caused by the 1897 cyclone, the 1937 cyclone, Japanese air raids during World War II, the Aboriginal people of the Larrakia language group are the traditional custodians and the first inhabitants of the greater Darwin area. They had trading routes with Southeast Asia, and imported goods from as far afield as South, established songlines penetrated throughout the country, allowing stories and histories to be told and retold along the routes. The extent of shared songlines and history of multiple groups within this area is still contestable. The Dutch visited Australias northern coastline in the 1600s and landed on the Tiwi Islands only to be repelled by the Tiwi peoples, the Dutch created the first European maps of the area. This accounts for the Dutch names in the area, such as Arnhem Land, the first British person to see Darwin harbour appears to have been Lieutenant John Lort Stokes of HMS Beagle on 9 September 1839. The ships captain, Commander John Clements Wickham, named the port after Charles Darwin, in 1863, the Northern Territory was tranferred from New South Wales to South Australia. In 1864 South Australia sent B. T. Finniss north as Government Resident to survey, Finniss chose a site at Escape Cliffs, near the entrance to Adelaide River, about 60 km northeast of the modern city. This attempt was short-lived, however, and the settlement abandoned by 1865, on 5 February 1869, George Goyder, the Surveyor-General of South Australia, established a small settlement of 135 people at Port Darwin between Fort Hill and the escarpment. Goyder named the settlement Palmerston, after the British Prime Minister Lord Palmerston, in 1870, the first poles for the Overland Telegraph were erected in Darwin, connecting Australia to the rest of the world
10.
Northern Territory
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The Northern Territory is a federal Australian territory in the central and central northern regions of Australia. It shares borders with Western Australia to the west, South Australia to the south, to the north, the territory is bordered by the Timor Sea, the Arafura Sea and the Gulf of Carpentaria. Despite its large area—over 1,349,129 square kilometres, the Northern Territorys population of 244,000 makes it the least populous of Australias eight major states and territories, having fewer than half as many people as Tasmania. The archaeological history of the Northern Territory begins over 40,000 years ago when Indigenous Australians settled the region, makassan traders began trading with the indigenous people of the Northern Territory for trepang from at least the 18th century onwards. The coast of the territory was first seen by Europeans in the 17th century, the British were the first Europeans to attempt to settle the coastal regions. After three failed attempts to establish a settlement, success was achieved in 1869 with the establishment of a settlement at Port Darwin. Today the economy is based on tourism, especially Kakadu National Park in the Top End and the Uluru-Kata Tjuta National Park in central Australia, the capital and largest city is Darwin. The population is not concentrated in regions but rather along the Stuart Highway. The other major settlements are Palmerston, Alice Springs, Katherine, Nhulunbuy, residents of the Northern Territory are often known simply as Territorians and fully as Northern Territorians, or more informally as Top Enders and Centralians. With the coming of the British, there were four attempts to settle the harsh environment of the northern coast. The Northern Territory was part of colonial New South Wales from 1825 to 1863, except for a time from February to December 1846. It was part of South Australia from 1863 to 1911, under the administration of colonial South Australia, the overland telegraph was constructed between 1870 and 1872. A railway was built between Palmerston and Pine Creek between 1883 and 1889. The economic pattern of raising and mining was established so that by 1911 there were 513,000 cattle. Victoria River Downs was at one time the largest cattle station in the world, gold was found at Grove Hill in 1872 and at Pine Creek, Brocks Creek, Burrundi, and copper was found at Daly River. On 1 January 1911, a decade after federation, the Northern Territory was separated from South Australia, alfred Deakin opined at this time To me the question has been not so much commercial as national, first, second, third and last. Either we must accomplish the peopling of the territory or submit to its transfer to some other nation. In late 1912 there was growing sentiment that the name Northern Territory was unsatisfactory, the names Kingsland, Centralia and Territoria were proposed with Kingsland becoming the preferred choice in 1913
11.
Australia
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Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania and numerous smaller islands. It is the worlds sixth-largest country by total area, the neighbouring countries are Papua New Guinea, Indonesia and East Timor to the north, the Solomon Islands and Vanuatu to the north-east, and New Zealand to the south-east. Australias capital is Canberra, and its largest urban area is Sydney, for about 50,000 years before the first British settlement in the late 18th century, Australia was inhabited by indigenous Australians, who spoke languages classifiable into roughly 250 groups. The population grew steadily in subsequent decades, and by the 1850s most of the continent had been explored, on 1 January 1901, the six colonies federated, forming the Commonwealth of Australia. Australia has since maintained a liberal democratic political system that functions as a federal parliamentary constitutional monarchy comprising six states. The population of 24 million is highly urbanised and heavily concentrated on the eastern seaboard, Australia has the worlds 13th-largest economy and ninth-highest per capita income. With the second-highest human development index globally, the country highly in quality of life, health, education, economic freedom. The name Australia is derived from the Latin Terra Australis a name used for putative lands in the southern hemisphere since ancient times, the Dutch adjectival form Australische was used in a Dutch book in Batavia in 1638, to refer to the newly discovered lands to the south. On 12 December 1817, Macquarie recommended to the Colonial Office that it be formally adopted, in 1824, the Admiralty agreed that the continent should be known officially as Australia. The first official published use of the term Australia came with the 1830 publication of The Australia Directory and these first inhabitants may have been ancestors of modern Indigenous Australians. The Torres Strait Islanders, ethnically Melanesian, were originally horticulturists, the northern coasts and waters of Australia were visited sporadically by fishermen from Maritime Southeast Asia. The first recorded European sighting of the Australian mainland, and the first recorded European landfall on the Australian continent, are attributed to the Dutch. The first ship and crew to chart the Australian coast and meet with Aboriginal people was the Duyfken captained by Dutch navigator, Willem Janszoon. He sighted the coast of Cape York Peninsula in early 1606, the Dutch charted the whole of the western and northern coastlines and named the island continent New Holland during the 17th century, but made no attempt at settlement. William Dampier, an English explorer and privateer, landed on the north-west coast of New Holland in 1688, in 1770, James Cook sailed along and mapped the east coast, which he named New South Wales and claimed for Great Britain. The first settlement led to the foundation of Sydney, and the exploration, a British settlement was established in Van Diemens Land, now known as Tasmania, in 1803, and it became a separate colony in 1825. The United Kingdom formally claimed the part of Western Australia in 1828. Separate colonies were carved from parts of New South Wales, South Australia in 1836, Victoria in 1851, the Northern Territory was founded in 1911 when it was excised from South Australia
12.
Jeddah
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Jeddah is a city in the Hijaz Tihamah region on the coast of the Red Sea and is the major urban center of western Saudi Arabia. It is the largest city in Makkah Province, the largest sea port on the Red Sea, with a population currently at 4.2 million people, Jeddah is an important commercial hub in Saudi Arabia. Jeddah is the gateway to Mecca, Islams holiest city. It is also a gateway to Medina, the second holiest place in Islam, economically, Jeddah is focusing on further developing capital investment in scientific and engineering leadership within Saudi Arabia, and the Middle East. Jeddah was independently ranked fourth in the Africa – Mid-East region in terms of innovation in 2009 in the Innovation Cities Index, Jeddah is one of Saudi Arabias primary resort cities and was named a Gamma world city by the Globalization and World Cities Study Group and Network. Given the citys proximity to the Red Sea, fishing. The city has been labeled as different by the majority of Saudis in an effort to promote tourism in the city, historically, Jeddah has been well known for its legendary money changers. The largest of said money changers at the time eventually founded Saudi Arabias first bank, there are at least two explanations for the etymology of the name Jeddah, according to Jeddah Ibn Al-Qudaaiy, the chief of the Qudaa clan. The more common account has it that the name is derived from جدة Jaddah, according to eastern folk belief, the tomb of Eve, considered the grandmother of humanity, is located in Jeddah. The tomb was sealed with concrete by religious authorities in 1975 due to some Muslims praying at the site, Ibn Battuta, the Berber traveler, visited Jeddah during his world trip. He wrote the name of the city into his diary as Jiddah, the British Foreign Office and other branches of the British government used the older spelling of Jedda, contrary to other English-speaking usage, but in 2007, it changed to the spelling Jeddah. T. E. Lawrence felt that any transcription of Arabic names into English was arbitrary, in his book, Revolt in the Desert, Jeddah is spelled three different ways on the first page alone. On official Saudi maps and documents, the city name is transcribed Jeddah, some historians trace its founding to the tribe of Bani Qudaah, who inhabited it after the collapse of Sad Marib in 115 BC. According to some accounts, the history of Jeddah dates back to times before Alexander the Great. The city of Jeddah was an important port during Nabataeans frankincense trade. The oldest Mashrabiya was found in dates back to pre Islamic era. Jeddah first achieved prominence around AD647, when the third Muslim Caliph, Uthman Ibn Affan, in AD703 Jeddah was briefly occupied by pirates from the Kingdom of Axum. Jeddah has been established as the city of the historic Hijaz province. In the 969 AD, the Fatimids from Algeria took control in Egypt from the Ikhshidid dynasty and expanded their empire to the regions, including The Hijaz
13.
Saudi Arabia
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Saudi Arabia is bordered by Jordan and Iraq to the north, Kuwait to the northeast, Qatar, Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates to the east, Oman to the southeast and Yemen to the south. It is separated from Israel and Egypt by the Gulf of Aqaba and it is the only nation with both a Red Sea coast and a Persian Gulf coast and most of its terrain consists of arid desert and mountains. The area of modern-day Saudi Arabia formerly consisted of four regions, Hejaz, Najd and parts of Eastern Arabia. The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia was founded in 1932 by Ibn Saud and he united the four regions into a single state through a series of conquests beginning in 1902 with the capture of Riyadh, the ancestral home of his family, the House of Saud. Saudi Arabia has since been a monarchy, effectively a hereditary dictatorship governed along Islamic lines. The ultraconservative Wahhabi religious movement within Sunni Islam has been called the predominant feature of Saudi culture, with its global spread largely financed by the oil and gas trade. Saudi Arabia is sometimes called the Land of the Two Holy Mosques in reference to Al-Masjid al-Haram and Al-Masjid an-Nabawi, the state has a total population of 28.7 million, of which 20 million are Saudi nationals and 8 million are foreigners. The states official language is Arabic, petroleum was discovered on 3 March 1938 and followed up by several other finds in the Eastern Province. Saudi Arabia has since become the worlds largest oil producer and exporter, controlling the second largest oil reserves. The kingdom is categorized as a World Bank high-income economy with a high Human Development Index and is the only Arab country to be part of the G-20 major economies. However, the economy of Saudi Arabia is the least diversified in the Gulf Cooperation Council, the state has attracted criticism for its treatment of women and use of capital punishment. Saudi Arabia is an autocracy, has the fourth highest military expenditure in the world. Saudi Arabia is considered a regional and middle power, in addition to the GCC, it is an active member of the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation and OPEC. Following the unification of the Hejaz and Nejd kingdoms, the new state was named al-Mamlakah al-ʻArabīyah as-Suʻūdīyah by royal decree on 23 September 1932 by its founder, Abdulaziz Al Saud. Although this is translated as the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia in English it literally means the Saudi Arab kingdom. Its inclusion expresses the view that the country is the possession of the royal family. Al Saud is an Arabic name formed by adding the word Al, meaning family of or House of, in the case of the Al Saud, this is the father of the dynastys 18th century founder, Muhammad bin Saud. There is evidence that human habitation in the Arabian Peninsula dates back to about 125,000 years ago
14.
Chennai
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Chennai /ˈtʃɛnnaɪ/, formerly known as Madras /məˈdrɑːs/ or /-ˈdræs/) is the capital of the Indian state of Tamil Nadu. Located on the Coromandel Coast off the Bay of Bengal, it is one of the biggest cultural, economic, according to the 2011 Indian census, it is the sixth-largest city and fourth-most populous urban agglomeration in India. The city together with the adjoining regions constitute the Chennai Metropolitan Area, Chennai is among the most visited Indian cities by foreign tourists. It was ranked 43rd most visited city in the world for year 2015, the Quality of Living Survey rated Chennai as the safest city in India. Chennai attracts 45 percent of tourists visiting India, and 30 to 40 percent of domestic health tourists. As such, it is termed Indias health capital, as a growing metropolitan city in a developing country, Chennai confronts substantial pollution and other logistical and socio-economic problems. Chennai has the third-largest expatriate population in India at 35,000 in 2009,82,790 in 2011, tourism guide publisher Lonely Planet named Chennai as one of the top ten cities in the world to visit in 2015. Chennai is ranked as a city in the Global Cities Index and was ranked the best city in India by India Today in the 2014 annual Indian city survey. In 2015 Chennai was named the hottest city by the BBC, National Geographic ranked Chennais food as second best in the world, it was the only Indian city to feature in the list. Chennai was also named the ninth-best cosmopolitan city in the world by Lonely Planet, the Chennai Metropolitan Area is one of the largest city economies of India. Chennai is nicknamed The Detroit of India, with more than one-third of Indias automobile industry being based in the city, in January 2015, it was ranked third in terms of per capita GDP. Chennai has been selected as one of the 100 Indian cities to be developed as a city under PM Narendra Modis flagship Smart Cities Mission. The name Madras originated even before the British presence was established in India, the name Madras is said to have originated from a Portuguese phrase mae de Deus which means mother of god, due to Portuguese influence on the port city. According to some sources, Madras was derived from Madraspattinam, a north of Fort St George. However, it is whether the name was in use before the arrival of Europeans. The British military mapmakers believed Madras was originally Mundir-raj or Mundiraj, Madras might have also been derived from the word Madhuras meaning juice of honey or sugarcane in Sanskrit. The nativity of name Chennai, being of Telugu origin is clearly proved by the historians. The first official use of the name Chennai is said to be in a deed, dated 8 August 1639
15.
Key West
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Key West is an island city in Florida and the county seat of Monroe County. The city boundaries include the island of Key West and several islands, as well as the section of Stock Island north of U. S. Route 1. Sigsbee Park—originally known as Dredgers Key—and Fleming Key, both located to the north, and Sunset Key located to the west are all included in the city boundaries, both Fleming Key and Sigsbee Park are part of Naval Air Station Key West and are inaccessible to the general public. Key West is the southernmost city in the contiguous United States and the terminus of U. S. Route 1, State Road A1A, the East Coast Greenway and, before 1935. Key West is 129 miles southwest of Miami by air, about 160 miles by car, Cuba, at its closest point, is 94 miles south. Key West is a destination for many passenger cruise ships. The Key West International Airport provides airline service, the central business district is located along Duval Street and includes much of the northwestern corner of the island. The official city motto is One Human Family, in Pre-Colonial times Key West was inhabited by the Calusa people. The first European to visit was Juan Ponce de León in 1521, as Florida became a Spanish territory, a fishing and salvage village with a small garrison was established here. Cayo Hueso is the original Spanish name for the island of Key West, spanish-speaking people today also use the term when referring to Key West. It is said that the island was littered with the remains of native inhabitants. This island was the westernmost Key with a supply of water. In 1763, when Great Britain took control of Florida, the community of Spaniards, Florida returned to Spanish control 20 years later, but there was no official resettlement of the island. Informally the island was used by fishermen from Cuba and from the British, while claimed by Spain, no nation exercised de facto control over the community there for some time. In 1815, the Spanish governor of Cuba in Havana deeded the island of Key West to Juan Pablo Salas, businessman John W. Simonton, during a meeting in a Havana café on January 19,1822, for the equivalent of $2,000 in pesos in 1821. Geddes tried in vain to secure his rights to the property before Simonton who, Simonton had wide-ranging business interests in Mobile, Alabama. He bought the island because a friend, John Whitehead, had drawn his attention to the opportunities presented by the strategic location. John Whitehead had been stranded in Key West after a shipwreck in 1819, on March 25,1822, Lt. Commander, Matthew C
16.
Florida
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Florida /ˈflɒrᵻdə/ is a state located in the southeastern region of the United States. It is bordered to the west by the Gulf of Mexico, to the north by Alabama and Georgia, to the east by the Atlantic Ocean, Florida is the 22nd-most extensive, the 3rd-most populous, and the 8th-most densely populated of the U. S. states. Jacksonville is the most populous municipality in the state and is the largest city by area in the contiguous United States, the Miami metropolitan area is Floridas most populous urban area. The city of Tallahassee is the state capital, much of the state is at or near sea level and is characterized by sedimentary soil. The climate varies from subtropical in the north to tropical in the south, the American alligator, American crocodile, Florida panther, and manatee can be found in the Everglades National Park. It was a location of the Seminole Wars against the Native Americans. Today, Florida is distinctive for its large Cuban expatriate community and high population growth, the states economy relies mainly on tourism, agriculture, and transportation, which developed in the late 19th century. Florida is also renowned for amusement parks, orange crops, the Kennedy Space Center, Florida has attracted many writers such as Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings, Ernest Hemingway and Tennessee Williams, and continues to attract celebrities and athletes. It is internationally known for golf, tennis, auto racing, by the 16th century, the earliest time for which there is a historical record, major Native American groups included the Apalachee, the Timucua, the Ais, the Tocobaga, the Calusa and the Tequesta. Florida was the first part of the continental United States to be visited and settled by Europeans, the earliest known European explorers came with the Spanish conquistador Juan Ponce de León. Ponce de León spotted and landed on the peninsula on April 2,1513 and he named the region La Florida. The story that he was searching for the Fountain of Youth is a myth, in May 1539, Conquistador Hernando de Soto skirted the coast of Florida, searching for a deep harbor to land. He described seeing a wall of red mangroves spread mile after mile, some reaching as high as 70 feet. Very soon, many smokes appeared along the whole coast, billowing against the sky, the Spanish introduced Christianity, cattle, horses, sheep, the Spanish language, and more to Florida. Both the Spanish and French established settlements in Florida, with varying degrees of success, in 1559, Don Tristán de Luna y Arellano established a settlement at present-day Pensacola, making it the first attempted settlement in Florida, but it was abandoned by 1561. Spain maintained tenuous control over the region by converting the tribes to Christianity. The area of Spanish Florida diminished with the establishment of English settlements to the north, the English attacked St. Augustine, burning the city and its cathedral to the ground several times. Florida attracted numerous Africans and African-Americans from adjacent British colonies who sought freedom from slavery, in 1738, Governor Manuel de Montiano established Fort Gracia Real de Santa Teresa de Mose near St
17.
United States
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Forty-eight of the fifty states and the federal district are contiguous and located in North America between Canada and Mexico. The state of Alaska is in the northwest corner of North America, bordered by Canada to the east, the state of Hawaii is an archipelago in the mid-Pacific Ocean. The U. S. territories are scattered about the Pacific Ocean, the geography, climate and wildlife of the country are extremely diverse. At 3.8 million square miles and with over 324 million people, the United States is the worlds third- or fourth-largest country by area, third-largest by land area. It is one of the worlds most ethnically diverse and multicultural nations, paleo-Indians migrated from Asia to the North American mainland at least 15,000 years ago. European colonization began in the 16th century, the United States emerged from 13 British colonies along the East Coast. Numerous disputes between Great Britain and the following the Seven Years War led to the American Revolution. On July 4,1776, during the course of the American Revolutionary War, the war ended in 1783 with recognition of the independence of the United States by Great Britain, representing the first successful war of independence against a European power. The current constitution was adopted in 1788, after the Articles of Confederation, the first ten amendments, collectively named the Bill of Rights, were ratified in 1791 and designed to guarantee many fundamental civil liberties. During the second half of the 19th century, the American Civil War led to the end of slavery in the country. By the end of century, the United States extended into the Pacific Ocean. The Spanish–American War and World War I confirmed the status as a global military power. The end of the Cold War and the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991 left the United States as the sole superpower. The U. S. is a member of the United Nations, World Bank, International Monetary Fund, Organization of American States. The United States is a developed country, with the worlds largest economy by nominal GDP. It ranks highly in several measures of performance, including average wage, human development, per capita GDP. While the U. S. economy is considered post-industrial, characterized by the dominance of services and knowledge economy, the United States is a prominent political and cultural force internationally, and a leader in scientific research and technological innovations. In 1507, the German cartographer Martin Waldseemüller produced a map on which he named the lands of the Western Hemisphere America after the Italian explorer and cartographer Amerigo Vespucci
18.
Hurricane Wilma
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A tropical depression formed in the Caribbean Sea near Jamaica on October 15, and intensified into a tropical storm two days later, which was named Wilma. After heading westward as a depression, Wilma turned abruptly southward after becoming a tropical storm. Wilma continued intensifying, and eventually became a hurricane on October 18, shortly thereafter, explosive intensification occurred, and in only 24 hours, Wilma became a Category 5 hurricane with winds of 185 mph. Intensity slowly leveled off after becoming a Category 5 hurricane, after crossing the Yucatán Peninsula, Wilma emerged into the Gulf of Mexico as a Category 2 hurricane. As Wilma began accelerating to the northeast, gradual re-intensification occurred, shortly thereafter, Wilma made landfall in Cape Romano, Florida with winds of 120 mph. As Wilma was crossing Florida, it had weakened back to a Category 2 hurricane. The hurricane intensified into a Category 3 hurricane for the final occasion, by October 26, Wilma transitioned into an extratropical cyclone southeast of Nova Scotia. Wilma made several landfalls, with the most destructive effects felt in the Yucatán Peninsula of Mexico, Cuba, at least 62 deaths were reported, and damage is estimated at $29.4 billion, $21 billion of which occurred in the United States alone. As a result, Wilma is ranked as the fifth costliest storm in United States history, Wilma is the most recent major hurricane to make landfall in the contiguous United States. It was also the last hurricane to strike the state of Florida until Hurricane Hermine did so in 2016, nearly 10 years 11 months later, a record length of time. A broad area of low pressure developed on October 13 to the southeast of Jamaica, initially, development was slow, due to the large size of the storm and a flat pressure gradient. However, convection gradually organized, and from October 18 through October 19, around 12,00 UTC on October 18, the system intensified into a hurricane. In a 30‑hour period, the pressure dropped from 982 mbar to the record-low of 882 mbar, during its intensification on October 19, the hurricanes eye shrank to as small as 2.3 mi in diameter, becoming the smallest eye ever seen in a tropical cyclone. On October 20, Wilma weakened below Category 5 intensity to 155 mph due to a replacement cycle, began to turn towards the northwest. Despite Wilma spending 24 hours over land, it reemerged with little intensity lost and this was perhaps due to its large size and because the majority of its circulation remained over the warm waters of the northwest Caribbean and Gulf of Mexico. A powerful trough turned the hurricane to the northeast and accelerated its forward motion, Wilma crossed the state in about 4.6 hours and weakened to winds of 110 mph after entering the Atlantic Ocean near Jupiter, Florida. Key West received several feet of water in the low-lying areas, the Lower Keys also experienced an unusual flood, it occurred twice. First, as the storm approached Florida, it pushed water across the keys from south to north, as the storm finally crossed into the Everglades, all the water that had been pushed by the storm was released as Wilma crossed the peninsula
19.
Storm surge
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Most casualties during tropical cyclones occur as the result of storm surges. The deadliest storm surge on record was the 1970 Bhola cyclone, the low-lying coast of the Bay of Bengal is particularly vulnerable to surges caused by tropical cyclones. The deadliest storm surge in the twenty-first century was caused by the Cyclone Nargis, the next deadliest in this century was caused by the Typhoon Haiyan, which killed more than 6,000 people in the central Philippines in 2013 and resulted in economic losses estimated at $14 billion. Louis, Diamondhead and Pass Christian in Mississippi, a high storm surge occurred in New York City from Hurricane Sandy in October 2012, with a high tide of 14 ft. The pressure effects of a tropical cyclone will cause the level in the open ocean to rise in regions of low atmospheric pressure. The rising water level will counteract the low pressure such that the total pressure at some plane beneath the water surface remains constant. This effect is estimated at a 10 mm increase in sea level for every millibar drop in atmospheric pressure, strong surface winds cause surface currents at a 45° angle to the wind direction, by an effect known as the Ekman Spiral. Wind stresses cause a phenomenon referred to as wind set-up, which is the tendency for water levels to increase at the downwind shore, intuitively, this is caused by the storm simply blowing the water towards one side of the basin in the direction of its winds. Because the Ekman Spiral effects spread vertically through the water, the effect is proportional to depth. The pressure effect and the wind set-up on an open coast will be driven into bays in the way as the astronomical tide. The Earths rotation causes the Coriolis effect, which bends currents to the right in the Northern Hemisphere and to the left in the Southern Hemisphere. When this bend brings the currents into more contact with the shore it can amplify the surge. The effect of waves, while powered by the wind, is distinct from a storms wind-powered currents. Powerful wind whips up large, strong waves in the direction of its movement, although these surface waves are responsible for very little water transport in open water, they may be responsible for significant transport near the shore. When waves are breaking on a more or less parallel to the beach. The rainfall effect is experienced predominantly in estuaries, Hurricanes may dump as much as 12 in of rainfall in 24 hours over large areas, and higher rainfall densities in localized areas. As a result, watersheds can quickly surge water into the rivers that drain them and this can increase the water level near the head of tidal estuaries as storm-driven waters surging in from the ocean meet rainfall flowing from the estuary. This situation well exemplified by the southeast coast of Florida
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.
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
22.
Atlanta
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Atlanta is the capital of and the most populous city in the U. S. state of Georgia, with an estimated 2015 population of 463,878. Atlanta is the cultural and economic center of the Atlanta metropolitan area, home to 5,710,795 people, Atlanta is the county seat of Fulton County, and a small portion of the city extends eastward into DeKalb County. In 1837, Atlanta was founded at the intersection of two lines, and the city rose from the ashes of the American Civil War to become a national center of commerce. Atlantas economy is considered diverse, with dominant sectors that include logistics, professional and business services, media operations, Atlanta has topographic features that include rolling hills and dense tree coverage. Revitalization of Atlantas neighborhoods, initially spurred by the 1996 Olympics in Atlanta, has intensified in the 21st century, altering the demographics, politics. Prior to the arrival of European settlers in north Georgia, Creek Indians inhabited the area, standing Peachtree, a Creek village located where Peachtree Creek flows into the Chattahoochee River, was the closest Indian settlement to what is now Atlanta. As part of the removal of Native Americans from northern Georgia from 1802 to 1825, the Creek ceded the area in 1821. In 1836, the Georgia General Assembly voted to build the Western, the initial route was to run southward from Chattanooga to a terminus east of the Chattahoochee River, which would then be linked to Savannah. After engineers surveyed various possible locations for the terminus, the zero milepost was driven into the ground in what is now Five Points. A year later, the area around the milepost had developed into a settlement, first known as Terminus, and later as Thrasherville after a merchant who built homes. By 1842, the town had six buildings and 30 residents and was renamed Marthasville to honor the Governors daughter, later, J. Edgar Thomson, Chief Engineer of the Georgia Railroad, suggested the town be renamed Atlantica-Pacifica, which was shortened to Atlanta. The residents approved, and the town was incorporated as Atlanta on December 29,1847, by 1860, Atlantas population had grown to 9,554. During the American Civil War, the nexus of multiple railroads in Atlanta made the city a hub for the distribution of military supplies, in 1864, the Union Army moved southward following the capture of Chattanooga and began its invasion of north Georgia. On the next day, Mayor James Calhoun surrendered Atlanta to the Union Army, on November 11,1864, Sherman prepared for the Union Armys March to the Sea by ordering Atlanta to be burned to the ground, sparing only the citys churches and hospitals. After the Civil War ended in 1865, Atlanta was gradually rebuilt, due to the citys superior rail transportation network, the state capital was moved from Milledgeville to Atlanta in 1868. In the 1880 Census, Atlanta surpassed Savannah as Georgias largest city, by 1885, the founding of the Georgia School of Technology and the citys black colleges had established Atlanta as a center for higher education. In 1895, Atlanta hosted the Cotton States and International Exposition, during the first decades of the 20th century, Atlanta experienced a period of unprecedented growth. In three decades time, Atlantas population tripled as the city expanded to include nearby streetcar suburbs
23.
Flash flood
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A flash flood is a rapid flooding of geomorphic low-lying areas, washes, rivers, dry lakes and basins. It may be caused by heavy rain associated with a thunderstorm, hurricane, tropical storm. Flash floods may occur after the collapse of an ice or debris dam, or a human structure such as a man-made dam. Flash floods are distinguished from regular floods by a timescale of less than six hours, the water that is temporarily available is often used by foliage with rapid germination and short growth cycles, and by specially adapted animal life. Flash floods can occur under several types of conditions, Flash flooding occurs when it rains rapidly on saturated soil or dry soil that has poor absorption ability. The runoff collects in gullies and streams and, as they join to form larger volumes, often forms a fast flowing front of water, in areas on or near volcanoes, flash floods have also occurred after eruptions, when glaciers have been melted by the intense heat. Flash floods are known to occur in the highest mountain ranges of the United States and are common in the arid plains of the Southwestern United States. Flash flooding can also be caused by extensive rainfall released by hurricanes and other tropical storms, human activities can also cause flash floods to occur. When dams fail, a quantity of water can be released. Many people tend to underestimate the dangers of flash floods, what makes flash floods most dangerous is their sudden nature and fast-moving water. A vehicle provides little to no protection against being swept away, it may make people overconfident, more than half of the fatalities attributed to flash floods are people swept away in vehicles when trying to cross flooded intersections. As little as 2 feet of water is enough to carry away most SUV-sized vehicles. The U. S. National Weather Service reported in 2005 that, using a national 30-year average, more people die yearly in floods,127 on average, than by lightning, tornadoes, in deserts, flash floods can be particularly deadly for several reasons. First, storms in arid regions are infrequent, but they can deliver an enormous amount of water in a short time. Second, these rains often fall on poorly absorbent and often clay-like soil, in fact, in some areas, desert roads frequently cross dry river and creek beds without bridges. From the drivers perspective, there may be clear weather, when a river unexpectedly forms ahead of or around the vehicle in a matter of seconds. Finally, the lack of rain to clear water channels may cause flash floods in deserts to be headed by large amounts of debris, such as rocks, branches. 1889, Johnstown Flood, Pennsylvania, U. S. more than 2,200 people dead 1903, Heppner Flood of 1903, Oregon, United States,247 dead, 25% of the city 1938, Los Angeles Flood of 1938, California, U. S. S
24.
Bangladesh
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Bangladesh, officially the Peoples Republic of Bangladesh, is a country in South Asia. It shares land borders with India and Myanmar, Nepal, Bhutan and China are located near Bangladesh but do not share a border with it. The countrys maritime territory in the Bay of Bengal is roughly equal to the size of its land area, Bangladesh is the worlds eighth most populous country. Dhaka is its capital and largest city, followed by Chittagong which has the countrys largest port, Bangladesh forms the largest and eastern part of the Bengal region. Bangladeshis include people of different ethnic groups and religions, Bengalis, who speak the official Bengali, make up 98% of the population. The politically dominant Bengali Muslims make the nation the worlds third largest Muslim-majority country, most of Bangladesh is covered by the Bengal delta, the largest delta on Earth. The country has 700 rivers and 8,046 km of inland waterways, highlands with evergreen forests are found in the northeastern and southeastern regions of the country. Bangladesh has many islands and a coral reef and it is home to the Sundarbans, the largest mangrove forest in the world. The countrys biodiversity includes a vast array of plant and wildlife, including critically endangered Bengal tigers, the Greeks and Romans identified the region as Gangaridai, a powerful kingdom of the historical subcontinent, in the 3rd century BCE. Archaeological research has unearthed several ancient cities in Bangladesh, which had trade links for millennia. The Bengal Sultanate and Mughal Bengal transformed the region into a cosmopolitan Islamic imperial power between the 14th and 18th centuries, the region was home to many principalities which had inland naval prowess. It was also a center of the worldwide muslin and silk trade. As part of British India, the region was influenced by the Bengali renaissance, the Partition of British India made East Bengal a part of the Dominion of Pakistan, and was renamed as East Pakistan. The region witnessed the Bengali Language Movement in 1952 and the Bangladesh Liberation War in 1971, after independence, a parliamentary republic was established. A presidential government was in place between 1975 and 1990, followed by a return to parliamentary democracy, the country has also been affected by poverty, natural disasters, hunger, dominant party systems and military coups. Bangladesh is a power and a major developing nation. Listed as one of the Next Eleven, it has the 46th largest economy and it is one of the largest textile exporters in the world. Its major trading partners are the European Union, the United States, China, India, Japan, Malaysia, with its strategically vital location between Southern, Eastern and Southeast Asia, Bangladesh is an important promoter of regional connectivity and cooperation
25.
Moderate-resolution imaging spectroradiometer
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The instruments capture data in 36 spectral bands ranging in wavelength from 0.4 µm to 14.4 µm and at varying spatial resolutions. Together the instruments image the entire Earth every 1 to 2 days, MODIS has used the marine optical buoy for vicarious calibration. MODIS is succeeded by the VIIRS instrument on board the Suomi NPP satellite launched in 2011, the MODIS characterization support team is dedicated to the production of high-quality MODIS calibrated product which is a precursor to every geophysical science product. A detailed description of the MCST mission statement and other details can be found at MCST Web, with its low spatial resolution but high temporal resolution, MODIS data is useful to track changes in the landscape over time. The United States Forest Services Remote Sensing Applications Center analyzes MODIS imagery on a basis to provide information for the management. The following MODIS Level 3 datasets are available from NASA, as processed by the Collection 5 software, most of the data is available in the HDF-EOS format — a variant of Hierarchical Data Format prescribed for the data derived from Earth Observing System missions. Imaging spectroscopy NASA World Wind Official NASA site MODIS bands and spectral ranges MODIS Images of the Day MODIS Image of the Day – Google Gadget referring to MODIS image of the day
26.
NASA
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President Dwight D. Eisenhower established NASA in 1958 with a distinctly civilian orientation encouraging peaceful applications in space science. The National Aeronautics and Space Act was passed on July 29,1958, disestablishing NASAs predecessor, the new agency became operational on October 1,1958. Since that time, most US space exploration efforts have led by NASA, including the Apollo Moon landing missions, the Skylab space station. Currently, NASA is supporting the International Space Station and is overseeing the development of the Orion Multi-Purpose Crew Vehicle, the agency is also responsible for the Launch Services Program which provides oversight of launch operations and countdown management for unmanned NASA launches. NASA shares data with various national and international such as from the Greenhouse Gases Observing Satellite. Since 2011, NASA has been criticized for low cost efficiency, from 1946, the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics had been experimenting with rocket planes such as the supersonic Bell X-1. In the early 1950s, there was challenge to launch a satellite for the International Geophysical Year. An effort for this was the American Project Vanguard, after the Soviet launch of the worlds first artificial satellite on October 4,1957, the attention of the United States turned toward its own fledgling space efforts. This led to an agreement that a new federal agency based on NACA was needed to conduct all non-military activity in space. The Advanced Research Projects Agency was created in February 1958 to develop technology for military application. On July 29,1958, Eisenhower signed the National Aeronautics and Space Act, a NASA seal was approved by President Eisenhower in 1959. Elements of the Army Ballistic Missile Agency and the United States Naval Research Laboratory were incorporated into NASA, earlier research efforts within the US Air Force and many of ARPAs early space programs were also transferred to NASA. In December 1958, NASA gained control of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, NASA has conducted many manned and unmanned spaceflight programs throughout its history. Some missions include both manned and unmanned aspects, such as the Galileo probe, which was deployed by astronauts in Earth orbit before being sent unmanned to Jupiter, the experimental rocket-powered aircraft programs started by NACA were extended by NASA as support for manned spaceflight. This was followed by a space capsule program, and in turn by a two-man capsule program. This goal was met in 1969 by the Apollo program, however, reduction of the perceived threat and changing political priorities almost immediately caused the termination of most of these plans. NASA turned its attention to an Apollo-derived temporary space laboratory, to date, NASA has launched a total of 166 manned space missions on rockets, and thirteen X-15 rocket flights above the USAF definition of spaceflight altitude,260,000 feet. The X-15 was an NACA experimental rocket-powered hypersonic research aircraft, developed in conjunction with the US Air Force, the design featured a slender fuselage with fairings along the side containing fuel and early computerized control systems
27.
Terra (satellite)
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Terra is a multi-national NASA scientific research satellite in a Sun-synchronous orbit around the Earth. It is the flagship of the Earth Observing System, the name Terra comes from the Latin word for Earth. The satellite was launched from Vandenberg Air Force Base on December 18,1999, aboard an Atlas IIAS vehicle and it was placed into a near-polar, sun-synchronous orbit at an altitude of 705km, with a 10, 30am descending node. Studies have used instruments on Terra to examine trends in global carbon monoxide, the data collected by Terra will ultimately become a new, 15-year global data set. In June and October 2008 the spacecraft was targeted by hackers who gained unauthorized access to its command and control systems, aqua Aura Man-made structures visible from space NASA Terra site
28.
Atrai River
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This article refers to Atreyee or Atrai river. For other articles regarding Atreyee see Atreyee, for the video game company, see Atari Atrai River flows in West Bengal and northern parts of Bangladesh. In ancient times the river was called Atrei and finds a mention in the Mahabharata and it is linked with Jorapani river, Fuleswari river, and Karatoya River. It originates in Siliguri ward no 40, near baikanthapur forest West Bengal and then flowing through Dinajpur District of Bangladesh. It passes through Kumarganj and Balurghat community development blocks in Dakshin Dinajpur district and it splits into two rivers—the Gabura and the Kankra in Dinajpur district. It crosses the Barind Tract and flows into Chalan Beel, the river serves as a perennial source of fishing, even though it is often the cause of flooding in many areas during monsoons. Total length of river is approximately 240 miles. The maximum depth of the river is 99 feet, the Atrai was formerly one of the greatest rivers of north Bengal for it was the main channel by which the waters of the Teesta discharged into the Ganges. In 1787, however, the Teesta broke away from its ancient bed and cut for itself a new, since then the Atrai has lost its importance and has now few traces of its former greatness. It enters the district from Rajshahi flowing through the Chalan Beel and this river presents one of the most striking instances of riverine changes in the district of Pabna
29.
European Union
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The European Union is a political and economic union of 28 member states that are located primarily in Europe. It has an area of 4,475,757 km2, the EU has developed an internal single market through a standardised system of laws that apply in all member states. Within the Schengen Area, passport controls have been abolished, a monetary union was established in 1999 and came into full force in 2002, and is composed of 19 EU member states which use the euro currency. The EU operates through a system of supranational and intergovernmental decision-making. The EU traces its origins from the European Coal and Steel Community, the community and its successors have grown in size by the accession of new member states and in power by the addition of policy areas to its remit. While no member state has left the EU or its antecedent organisations, the Maastricht Treaty established the European Union in 1993 and introduced European citizenship. The latest major amendment to the basis of the EU. The EU as a whole is the largest economy in the world, additionally,27 out of 28 EU countries have a very high Human Development Index, according to the United Nations Development Programme. In 2012, the EU was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, through the Common Foreign and Security Policy, the EU has developed a role in external relations and defence. The union maintains permanent diplomatic missions throughout the world and represents itself at the United Nations, the World Trade Organization, the G7, because of its global influence, the European Union has been described as an emerging superpower. After World War II, European integration was seen as an antidote to the nationalism which had devastated the continent. 1952 saw the creation of the European Coal and Steel Community, the supporters of the Community included Alcide De Gasperi, Jean Monnet, Robert Schuman, and Paul-Henri Spaak. These men and others are credited as the Founding fathers of the European Union. In 1957, Belgium, France, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands and West Germany signed the Treaty of Rome and they also signed another pact creating the European Atomic Energy Community for co-operation in developing nuclear energy. Both treaties came into force in 1958, the EEC and Euratom were created separately from the ECSC, although they shared the same courts and the Common Assembly. The EEC was headed by Walter Hallstein and Euratom was headed by Louis Armand, Euratom was to integrate sectors in nuclear energy while the EEC would develop a customs union among members. During the 1960s, tensions began to show, with France seeking to limit supranational power, Jean Rey presided over the first merged Commission. In 1973, the Communities enlarged to include Denmark, Ireland, Norway had negotiated to join at the same time, but Norwegian voters rejected membership in a referendum
30.
Water
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Water is a transparent and nearly colorless chemical substance that is the main constituent of Earths streams, lakes, and oceans, and the fluids of most living organisms. Its chemical formula is H2O, meaning that its molecule contains one oxygen, Water strictly refers to the liquid state of that substance, that prevails at standard ambient temperature and pressure, but it often refers also to its solid state or its gaseous state. It also occurs in nature as snow, glaciers, ice packs and icebergs, clouds, fog, dew, aquifers, Water covers 71% of the Earths surface. It is vital for all forms of life. Only 2. 5% of this water is freshwater, and 98. 8% of that water is in ice and groundwater. Less than 0. 3% of all freshwater is in rivers, lakes, and the atmosphere, a greater quantity of water is found in the earths interior. Water on Earth moves continually through the cycle of evaporation and transpiration, condensation, precipitation. Evaporation and transpiration contribute to the precipitation over land, large amounts of water are also chemically combined or adsorbed in hydrated minerals. Safe drinking water is essential to humans and other even though it provides no calories or organic nutrients. There is a correlation between access to safe water and gross domestic product per capita. However, some observers have estimated that by 2025 more than half of the population will be facing water-based vulnerability. A report, issued in November 2009, suggests that by 2030, in developing regions of the world. Water plays an important role in the world economy, approximately 70% of the freshwater used by humans goes to agriculture. Fishing in salt and fresh water bodies is a source of food for many parts of the world. Much of long-distance trade of commodities and manufactured products is transported by boats through seas, rivers, lakes, large quantities of water, ice, and steam are used for cooling and heating, in industry and homes. Water is an excellent solvent for a variety of chemical substances, as such it is widely used in industrial processes. Water is also central to many sports and other forms of entertainment, such as swimming, pleasure boating, boat racing, surfing, sport fishing, Water is a liquid at the temperatures and pressures that are most adequate for life. Specifically, at atmospheric pressure of 1 bar, water is a liquid between the temperatures of 273.15 K and 373.15 K
31.
Tide
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Tides are the rise and fall of sea levels caused by the combined effects of the gravitational forces exerted by the Moon and the Sun and the rotation of the Earth. Some shorelines experience a semi-diurnal tide—two nearly equal high and low tides each day, other locations experience a diurnal tide—only one high and low tide each day. A mixed tide—two uneven tides a day, or one high, Tides vary on timescales ranging from hours to years due to a number of factors. To make accurate records, tide gauges at fixed stations measure water level over time, gauges ignore variations caused by waves with periods shorter than minutes. These data are compared to the level usually called mean sea level. Tidal phenomena are not limited to the oceans, but can occur in other systems whenever a gravitational field varies in time. For example, the part of the Earth is affected by tides. Tide changes proceed via the following stages, Sea level rises over several hours, covering the intertidal zone, the water rises to its highest level, reaching high tide. Sea level falls over several hours, revealing the intertidal zone, the water stops falling, reaching low tide. Oscillating currents produced by tides are known as tidal streams, the moment that the tidal current ceases is called slack water or slack tide. The tide then reverses direction and is said to be turning, slack water usually occurs near high water and low water. But there are locations where the moments of slack tide differ significantly from those of high, Tides are commonly semi-diurnal, or diurnal. The two high waters on a day are typically not the same height, these are the higher high water. Similarly, the two low waters each day are the low water and the lower low water. The daily inequality is not consistent and is small when the Moon is over the equator. From the highest level to the lowest, Highest Astronomical Tide – The highest tide which can be predicted to occur, note that meteorological conditions may add extra height to the HAT. Mean High Water Springs – The average of the two high tides on the days of spring tides, mean High Water Neaps – The average of the two high tides on the days of neap tides. Mean Sea Level – This is the sea level
32.
Hydrology
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Hydrology is the scientific study of the movement, distribution, and quality of water on Earth and other planets, including the water cycle, water resources and environmental watershed sustainability. A practitioner of hydrology is a hydrologist, working within the fields of earth or environmental science, physical geography, geology or civil, Hydrology subdivides into surface water hydrology, groundwater hydrology, and marine hydrology. Domains of hydrology include hydrometeorology, surface hydrology, hydrogeology, drainage-basin management and water quality, oceanography and meteorology are not included because water is only one of many important aspects within those fields. Hydrological research can inform environmental engineering, policy and planning, the term hydrology comes from Greek, ὕδωρ, hýdōr, water, and λόγος, lógos, study. Chemical hydrology is the study of the characteristics of water. Ecohydrology is the study of interactions between organisms and the hydrologic cycle, hydrogeology is the study of the presence and movement of groundwater. Hydroinformatics is the adaptation of technology to hydrology and water resources applications. Hydrometeorology is the study of the transfer of water and energy between land and water surfaces and the lower atmosphere. Isotope hydrology is the study of the signatures of water. Surface hydrology is the study of processes that operate at or near Earths surface. Drainage basin management covers water-storage, in the form of reservoirs, water quality includes the chemistry of water in rivers and lakes, both of pollutants and natural solutes. Determining the water balance of a region, mitigating and predicting flood, landslide and drought risk. Real-time flood forecasting and flood warning, designing irrigation schemes and managing agricultural productivity. Part of the module in catastrophe modeling. Designing dams for water supply or hydroelectric power generation, designing sewers and urban drainage system. Analyzing the impacts of antecedent moisture on sanitary sewer systems, predicting geomorphologic changes, such as erosion or sedimentation. Assessing the impacts of natural and anthropogenic environmental change on water resources, assessing contaminant transport risk and establishing environmental policy guidelines. Hydrology has been a subject of investigation and engineering for millennia, for example, about 4000 BC the Nile was dammed to improve agricultural productivity of previously barren lands
33.
Agriculture
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Agriculture is the cultivation and breeding of animals, plants and fungi for food, fiber, biofuel, medicinal plants and other products used to sustain and enhance human life. Agriculture was the key development in the rise of human civilization. The study of agriculture is known as agricultural science, the history of agriculture dates back thousands of years, and its development has been driven and defined by greatly different climates, cultures, and technologies. Industrial agriculture based on large-scale monoculture farming has become the dominant agricultural methodology, genetically modified organisms are an increasing component of agriculture, although they are banned in several countries. Agricultural food production and water management are increasingly becoming global issues that are fostering debate on a number of fronts, the major agricultural products can be broadly grouped into foods, fibers, fuels, and raw materials. Specific foods include cereals, vegetables, fruits, oils, meats, fibers include cotton, wool, hemp, silk and flax. Raw materials include lumber and bamboo, other useful materials are also produced by plants, such as resins, dyes, drugs, perfumes, biofuels and ornamental products such as cut flowers and nursery plants. The word agriculture is a late Middle English adaptation of Latin agricultūra, from ager, field, Agriculture usually refers to human activities, although it is also observed in certain species of ant, termite and ambrosia beetle. To practice agriculture means to use resources to produce commodities which maintain life, including food, fiber, forest products, horticultural crops. This definition includes arable farming or agronomy, and horticulture, all terms for the growing of plants, even then, it is acknowledged that there is a large amount of knowledge transfer and overlap between silviculture and agriculture. In traditional farming, the two are often combined even on small landholdings, leading to the term agroforestry, Agriculture began independently in different parts of the globe, and included a diverse range of taxa. At least 11 separate regions of the Old and New World were involved as independent centers of origin, wild grains were collected and eaten from at least 105,000 years ago. Pigs were domesticated in Mesopotamia around 15,000 years ago, rice was domesticated in China between 13,500 and 8,200 years ago, followed by mung, soy and azuki beans. Sheep were domesticated in Mesopotamia between 13,000 and 11,000 years ago. From around 11,500 years ago, the eight Neolithic founder crops, emmer and einkorn wheat, hulled barley, peas, lentils, bitter vetch, chick peas and flax were cultivated in the Levant. Cattle were domesticated from the aurochs in the areas of modern Turkey. In the Andes of South America, the potato was domesticated between 10,000 and 7,000 years ago, along with beans, coca, llamas, alpacas, sugarcane and some root vegetables were domesticated in New Guinea around 9,000 years ago. Sorghum was domesticated in the Sahel region of Africa by 7,000 years ago, cotton was domesticated in Peru by 5,600 years ago, and was independently domesticated in Eurasia at an unknown time
34.
Civil engineering
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Civil engineering is traditionally broken into a number of sub-disciplines. It is the second-oldest engineering discipline after military engineering, and it is defined to distinguish non-military engineering from military engineering, Civil engineering takes place in the public sector from municipal through to national governments, and in the private sector from individual homeowners through to international companies. Engineering has been an aspect of life since the beginnings of human existence, during this time, transportation became increasingly important leading to the development of the wheel and sailing. The construction of pyramids in Egypt were some of the first instances of large structure constructions, the Romans developed civil structures throughout their empire, including especially aqueducts, insulae, harbors, bridges, dams and roads. In the 18th century, the civil engineering was coined to incorporate all things civilian as opposed to military engineering. The first self-proclaimed civil engineer was John Smeaton, who constructed the Eddystone Lighthouse, in 1771 Smeaton and some of his colleagues formed the Smeatonian Society of Civil Engineers, a group of leaders of the profession who met informally over dinner. Though there was evidence of some meetings, it was little more than a social society. In 1818 the Institution of Civil Engineers was founded in London, the institution received a Royal Charter in 1828, formally recognising civil engineering as a profession. The first private college to teach engineering in the United States was Norwich University. The first degree in engineering in the United States was awarded by Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in 1835. The first such degree to be awarded to a woman was granted by Cornell University to Nora Stanton Blatch in 1905, throughout ancient and medieval history most architectural design and construction was carried out by artisans, such as stonemasons and carpenters, rising to the role of master builder. Knowledge was retained in guilds and seldom supplanted by advances, structures, roads and infrastructure that existed were repetitive, and increases in scale were incremental. Brahmagupta, an Indian mathematician, used arithmetic in the 7th century AD, based on Hindu-Arabic numerals, Civil engineers typically possess an academic degree in civil engineering. The length of study is three to five years, and the degree is designated as a bachelor of engineering. The curriculum generally includes classes in physics, mathematics, project management, design, after taking basic courses in most sub-disciplines of civil engineering, they move onto specialize in one or more sub-disciplines at advanced levels. In most countries, a degree in engineering represents the first step towards professional certification. After completing a degree program, the engineer must satisfy a range of requirements before being certified. Once certified, the engineer is designated as a engineer, a chartered engineer
35.
Public health
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It is concerned with threats to health based on population health analysis. The population in question can be as small as a handful of people, Public health incorporates the interdisciplinary approaches of epidemiology, biostatistics and health services. Environmental health, community health, behavioral health, health economics, public policy, mental health and occupational safety, the focus of public health intervention is to improve health and quality of life through prevention and treatment of disease and other physical and mental health conditions. This is done through surveillance of cases and health indicators, there is a great disparity in access to health care and public health initiatives between developed nations and developing nations. In the developing world, public health infrastructures are still forming, many diseases are preventable through simple, nonmedical methods. For example, research has shown that the act of hand washing with soap can prevent many contagious diseases. Public health communications programs, vaccination programs and distribution of condoms are examples of public health measures. Measures such as these have contributed greatly to the health of populations, Public health plays an important role in disease prevention efforts in both the developing world and in developed countries, through local health systems and non-governmental organizations. The World Health Organization is the agency that coordinates and acts on global public health issues. Most countries have their own government public health agencies, sometimes known as ministries of health, for example, in the United States, the front line of public health initiatives are state and local health departments. In Canada, the Public Health Agency of Canada is the agency responsible for public health, emergency preparedness and response. The Public health system in India is managed by the Ministry of Health & Family Welfare of the government of India with state-owned health care facilities. Public health programs providing vaccinations have made strides in promoting health, including the eradication of smallpox, antibiotic resistance, also known as drug resistance, was the theme of World Health Day 2011. Although the prioritization of pressing public health issues is important, Laurie Garrett argues that there are following consequences, when foreign aid is funnelled into disease-specific programs, the importance of public health in general is disregarded. This public health problem of stovepiping is thought to create a lack of funds to other existing diseases in a given country. For example, the WHO reports that at least 220 million people suffer from diabetes. Its incidence is increasing rapidly, and it is projected that the number of diabetes deaths will double by the year 2030, the risk of type 2 diabetes is closely linked with the growing problem of obesity. The WHO’s latest estimates highlighted that globally approximately 1.5 billion adults were overweight in 2008, the United States is the leading country with 30. 6% of its population being obese
36.
River
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A river is a natural flowing watercourse, usually freshwater, flowing towards an ocean, sea, lake or another river. In some cases a river flows into the ground and becomes dry at the end of its course without reaching another body of water, small rivers can be referred to using names such as stream, creek, brook, rivulet, and rill. There are no official definitions for the term river as applied to geographic features. Many names for small rivers are specific to geographic location, examples are run in parts of the United States, burn in Scotland and northeast England. Sometimes a river is defined as being larger than a creek, but not always, Rivers are part of the hydrological cycle. Potamology is the study of rivers while limnology is the study of inland waters in general. Extraterrestrial rivers of liquid hydrocarbons have recently found on Titan. Channels may indicate past rivers on other planets, specifically outflow channels on Mars and rivers are theorised to exist on planets, a river begins at a source, follows a path called a course, and ends at a mouth or mouths. The water in a river is confined to a channel. In larger rivers there is also a wider floodplain shaped by flood-waters over-topping the channel. Floodplains may be wide in relation to the size of the river channel. This distinction between river channel and floodplain can be blurred, especially in areas where the floodplain of a river channel can become greatly developed by housing. Rivers can flow down mountains, through valleys or along plains, the term upriver refers to the direction towards the source of the river, i. e. against the direction of flow. Likewise, the term describes the direction towards the mouth of the river. The term left bank refers to the bank in the direction of flow. The river channel typically contains a stream of water, but some rivers flow as several interconnecting streams of water. Extensive braided rivers are now found in only a few regions worldwide and they also occur on peneplains and some of the larger river deltas. Anastamosing rivers are similar to braided rivers and are quite rare
37.
Lake
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A lake is an area of variable size filled with water, localized in a basin, that is surrounded by land, apart from any river or other outlet that serves to feed or drain the lake. Lakes lie on land and are not part of the ocean, and therefore are distinct from lagoons, Lakes can be contrasted with rivers or streams, which are usually flowing. Most lakes are fed and drained by rivers and streams, natural lakes are generally found in mountainous areas, rift zones, and areas with ongoing glaciation. Other lakes are found in endorheic basins or along the courses of mature rivers, in some parts of the world there are many lakes because of chaotic drainage patterns left over from the last Ice Age. All lakes are temporary over geologic time scales, as they will fill in with sediments or spill out of the basin containing them. The word lake comes from Middle English lake, from Old English lacu, from Proto-Germanic *lakō, cognates include Dutch laak, Middle Low German lāke as in, de, Moorlake, de, Wolfslake, de, Butterlake, German Lache, and Icelandic lækur. Also related are the English words leak and leach, none of these definitions completely excludes ponds and all are difficult to measure. For this reason, simple size-based definitions are used to separate ponds. One definition of lake is a body of water of 2 hectares or more in area, however, others have defined lakes as waterbodies of 5 hectares and above, or 8 hectares and above. Charles Elton, one of the founders of ecology, regarded lakes as waterbodies of 40 hectares or more. The term lake is used to describe a feature such as Lake Eyre. In common usage, many bear names ending with the word pond. One textbook illustrates this point with the following, In Newfoundland, for example, almost every lake is called a pond, whereas in Wisconsin, the majority of lakes on Earth are fresh water, and most lie in the Northern Hemisphere at higher latitudes. Canada, with a drainage system has an estimated 31,752 lakes larger than 3 square kilometres and an unknown total number of lakes. Finland has 187,888 lakes 500 square metres or larger, most lakes have at least one natural outflow in the form of a river or stream, which maintain a lakes average level by allowing the drainage of excess water. Some lakes do not have an outflow and lose water solely by evaporation or underground seepage or both. Many lakes are artificial and are constructed for power generation, aesthetic purposes, recreational purposes, industrial use. Globally, lakes are greatly outnumbered by ponds, of an estimated 304 million standing water bodies worldwide, 91% are 1 hectare or less in area
38.
Levee
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A levee, dike, dyke, embankment, floodbank or stopbank is an elongated naturally occurring ridge or artificially constructed fill or wall, which regulates water levels. It is usually earthen and often parallel to the course of a river in its floodplain or along low-lying coastlines, the word levee, from the French word levée, is used in American English. It originated in New Orleans a few years after the founding in 1718 and was later adopted by English speakers. The name derives from the trait of the ridges being raised higher than both the channel and the surrounding floodplains. The modern word dike or dyke most likely derives from the Dutch word dijk, the 126 kilometres long Westfriese Omringdijk was completed by 1250, and was formed by connecting existing older dikes. The Roman chronicler Tacitus even mentions that the rebellious Batavi pierced dikes to flood their land, the word dijk originally indicated both the trench and the bank. It is closely related to the English verb to dig, in Anglo-Saxon, the word dic already existed and was pronounced as dick in northern England and as ditch in the south. Similar to Dutch, the English origins of the lie in digging a trench. This practice has meant that the name may be given to either the excavation or the bank, thus Offas Dyke is a combined structure and Car Dyke is a trench though it once had raised banks as well. In the midlands and north of England, and in the United States, a dike is what a ditch is in the south, a property boundary marker or small drainage channel. Where it carries a stream, it may be called a dike as in Rippingale Running Dike. The Weir Dike is a dike in Bourne North Fen, near Twenty and alongside the River Glen. In the Norfolk and Suffolk Broads, a dyke may be a ditch or a narrow artificial channel off a river or broad for access or mooring, some longer dykes being named. In parts of Britain, particularly Scotland, a dyke may be a field wall, Levees can be mainly found along the sea, where dunes are not strong enough, along rivers for protection against high-floods, along lakes or along polders. Furthermore, levees have been built for the purpose of empoldering, the latter can be a controlled inundation by the military or a measure to prevent inundation of a larger area surrounded by levees. Levees have also built as field boundaries and as military defences. More on this type of levee can be found in the article on dry-stone walls, Levees can be permanent earthworks or emergency constructions built hastily in a flood emergency. When such a bank is added on top of an existing levee it is known as a cradge
39.
Precipitation
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In meteorology, precipitation is any product of the condensation of atmospheric water vapor that falls under gravity. The main forms of precipitation include drizzle, rain, sleet, snow, graupel, Precipitation occurs when a portion of the atmosphere becomes saturated with water vapor, so that the water condenses and precipitates. Thus, fog and mist are not precipitation but suspensions, because the vapor does not condense sufficiently to precipitate. Two processes, possibly acting together, can lead to air becoming saturated, Precipitation forms as smaller droplets coalesce via collision with other rain drops or ice crystals within a cloud. Short, intense periods of rain in scattered locations are called showers, moisture that is lifted or otherwise forced to rise over a layer of sub-freezing air at the surface may be condensed into clouds and rain. This process is active when freezing rain is occurring. A stationary front is often present near the area of freezing rain, provided necessary and sufficient atmospheric moisture content, the moisture within the rising air will condense into clouds, namely stratus and cumulonimbus. Eventually, the droplets will grow large enough to form raindrops. Lake-effect snowfall can be locally heavy, thundersnow is possible within a cyclones comma head and within lake effect precipitation bands. In mountainous areas, heavy precipitation is possible where upslope flow is maximized within windward sides of the terrain at elevation, on the leeward side of mountains, desert climates can exist due to the dry air caused by compressional heating. The movement of the trough, or intertropical convergence zone. Precipitation is a component of the water cycle, and is responsible for depositing the fresh water on the planet. Approximately 505,000 cubic kilometres of water falls as precipitation each year,398,000 cubic kilometres of it over the oceans and 107,000 cubic kilometres over land. Given the Earths surface area, that means the globally averaged annual precipitation is 990 millimetres, Climate classification systems such as the Köppen climate classification system use average annual rainfall to help differentiate between differing climate regimes. Precipitation may occur on celestial bodies, e. g. when it gets cold, Mars has precipitation which most likely takes the form of frost. Precipitation is a component of the water cycle, and is responsible for depositing most of the fresh water on the planet. Approximately 505,000 km3 of water falls as precipitation each year,398,000 km3 of it over the oceans, given the Earths surface area, that means the globally averaged annual precipitation is 990 millimetres. Mechanisms of producing precipitation include convective, stratiform, and orographic rainfall, Precipitation can be divided into three categories, based on whether it falls as liquid water, liquid water that freezes on contact with the surface, or ice
40.
Property
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In the abstract, property is that which belongs to or with something, whether as an attribute or as a component of said thing. In economics and political economy, there are three forms of property, private property, public property, and collective property. Property that jointly belongs to more than one party may be possessed or controlled thereby in very similar or very distinct ways, whether simply or complexly, whether equally or unequally. However, there is an expectation that each partys will with regard to the property be clearly defined and unconditional, so as to distinguish ownership and this mediating relationship between individual, property and state is called a property regime. The distinction between property and private property is regarded as a confusion since different individuals often hold differing rights over a single object. An article of property may have physical and incorporeal parts, a title, or a right of ownership, establishes the relation between the property and other persons, assuring the owner the right to dispose of the property as the owner sees fit. Often property is defined by the code of the sovereignty, and protected wholly or more usually partially by such entity. The standards of proof concerning proofs of ownerships are also addressed by the code of the local sovereignty, some philosophers assert that property rights arise from social convention, while others find justifications for them in morality or in natural law. Property, in the first instance, is a thing-in-itself, when a person finds a thing and takes that thing into that persons possession and control, then that thing becomes a thing-for-you for that person. Generally, the ground and any buildings which are attached are considered real property, while movable goods. Also, property cannot be considered a concept, because in the first instance. Various scholarly disciplines may treat the concept more systematically, but definitions vary, positive law defines such rights, and the judiciary can adjudicate and enforce property rights. According to Adam Smith, the expectation of profit from improving ones stock of capital rests on private property rights, Capitalism has as a central assumption that property rights encourage their holders to develop the property, generate wealth, and efficiently allocate resources based on the operation of markets. From this has evolved the modern conception of property as a right enforced by law, in the expectation that this will produce more wealth. In his text The Common Law, Oliver Wendell Holmes describes property as having two fundamental aspects, the first, possession, can be defined as control over a resource based on the practical inability of another to contradict the ends of the possessor. The second, title, is the expectation that others will recognize rights to control resource and he elaborates the differences between these two concepts, and proposes a history of how they came to be attached to persons, as opposed to families or to entities such as the church. Classical liberalism subscribes to the theory of property. They hold that each own their own life, it follows that one must own the products of that life
41.
Domestic animals
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This includes species which are semi-domesticated, undomesticated but captive-bred on a commercial scale, or commonly wild-caught, at least occasionally captive-bred, and tameable. A number of factors determine how quickly any changes may occur in a species, however, domestication is a gradual process, i. e. there is no precise moment in the history of a given species when it can be considered to have become fully domesticated. Archaeozoology has identified three classes of animal domesticates, commensals, adapted to a niche, prey animals sought for food. To sort the tables chronologically by date of domestication, refresh your browser window, as clicking the Date column heading will mix AD, due to the somewhat unclear outlines of what, precisely, constitutes domestication, there are some species that may or may not be fully domesticated. There are also species that are used or kept as pets by humans. Most animals on this table are at least somewhat altered from wild animals by their extensive interactions with humans. Many could not be released into the wild, or are in some way dependent on humans
42.
Channel (geography)
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In physical geography, a channel is a type of landform consisting of the outline of a path of relatively shallow and narrow body of fluid, most commonly the confine of a river, river delta or strait. The word is cognate to canal, and sometimes shows in this form, most examples of this are fjords in the Pacific Northwest, a notable exception is the Casiquiare canal. All likely share borrowing from Spanish, Portuguese or French, channels can be either natural or human-made. A channel is typically outlined in terms of its bed and banks, Channel initiation refers to the site on a mountain slope where water begins to flow between identifiable banks. This site is referred to as the head and it marks an important boundary between hillslope processes and fluvial processes. The channel head is the most upslope part of a network and is defined by flowing water between defined identifiable banks. A channel head forms as overland flow and/or subsurface flow accumulate to a point where shear stress can overcome resistance of the ground surface. Channel heads are associated with colluvium, hollows and landslides. Overland flow is a factor in channel initiation where saturation overland flow deepens to increase shear stress. Overland flows converge in topographical depressions where channel initiation begins, soil composition, vegetation, precipitation, and topography dictate the amount and rate of overland flow. The composition of a soil determines how quickly saturation occurs and cohesive strength retards the entrainment of material from overland flows, vegetation slows infiltration rates during precipitation events and plant roots anchor soil on hillslopes. Subsurface flow destabilizes soil and resurfaces on hillslopes where channel heads are often formed and this often results in abrupt channel heads and landslides. Natural channels are formed by fluvial process and are found across the Earth and these are mostly formed by flowing water from the hydrological cycle, though can also be formed by other fluids such as flowing lava. Channels also describe the course through a reef, sand bar, bay. One example is the Columbia River, a located in the US states of Washington and Oregon. A stream channel is the confine of a stream consisting of a bed. Stream channels exist in a variety of geometries, Stream channel development is controlled by both water and sediment movement. There is a difference between low gradient streams and high gradient streams, a wide variety of stream channel types can be distinguished
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Meander
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A meander, in general, is a bend in a sinuous watercourse or river. A meander forms when moving water in a stream erodes the outer banks and widens its valley, a stream of any volume may assume a meandering course, alternately eroding sediments from the outside of a bend and depositing them on the inside. The result is a pattern as the stream meanders back. When a meander gets cut off from the stream, an oxbow lake forms. Over time meanders migrate downstream, sometimes in such a time as to create civil engineering problems for local municipalities attempting to maintain stable roads. There is not yet full consistency or standardization of scientific terminology used to describe watercourses, a variety of symbols and schemes exist. Parameters based on mathematical formulae or numerical data vary as well, unless otherwise defined in a specific scheme meandering and sinuosity here are synonymous and mean any repetitious pattern of bends, or waveforms. In some schemes, meandering applies only to rivers with exaggerated circular loops or secondary meanders, sinuosity is one of the channel types that a stream may assume over all or part of its course. All streams are sinuous at some time in their history over some part of their length. The term derives from the Meander River located in present-day Turkey and known to the Ancient Greeks as Μαίανδρος Maiandros and its course is so exceedingly winding that everything winding is called meandering. The Meander River is located south of Izmir, east of the ancient Greek town of Miletus, now, Milet and it flows through a graben in the Menderes Massif, but has a flood plain much wider than the meander zone in its lower reach. Its modern Turkish name is the Büyük Menderes River, when a fluid is introduced to an initially straight channel which then bends, the sidewalls induce a pressure gradient that causes the fluid to alter course and follow the bend. From here, two opposing processes occur, irrotational flow and secondary flow, for a river to meander, secondary flow must dominate. Irrotational flow, From Bernoullis equations, high pressure results in low velocity, therefore, in the absence of secondary flow we would expect low fluid velocity at the outside bend and high fluid velocity at the inside bend. This classic fluid mechanics result is irrotational vortex flow, in the context of meandering rivers, its effects are dominated by those of secondary flow. Secondary flow, A force balance exists between pressure forces pointing to the bend of the river and centrifugal forces pointing to the outside bend of the river. In the context of meandering rivers, a boundary layer exists within the layer of fluid that interacts with the river bed. Inside that layer and following standard boundary-layer theory, the velocity of the fluid is effectively zero, centrifugal force, which depends on velocity, is also therefore effectively zero
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Waterway
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A waterway is any navigable body of water. A shipping route consists of one or several waterways, Waterways can include rivers, lakes, seas, oceans, and canals. Vessels using waterways vary from small animal-drawn barges to immense ocean tankers and ocean liners, media related to Waterways at Wikimedia Commons Waterscape - Britains official guide to canals, rivers and lakes
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Soil fertility
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In lands used for agriculture and other human activities, maintenance of soil fertility typically requires the use of soil conservation practices. This is because soil erosion and other forms of soil degradation generally result in a decline in quality with respect to one or more of the aspects indicated above, bioavailable phosphorus is the element in soil that is most often lacking. Nitrogen and potassium are also needed in substantial amounts, for this reason these three elements are always identified on a commercial fertilizer analysis. For example, a 10-10-15 fertilizer has 10 percent nitrogen,10 percent available phosphorus and 15 percent water-soluble potassium, sulfur is the fourth element that may be identified in a commercial analysis—e. g. 21-0-0-24 which would contain 21% nitrogen and 24% sulfate, inorganic fertilizers are generally less expensive and have higher concentrations of nutrients than organic fertilizers. However, some have criticized the use of fertilizers, claiming that the water-soluble nitrogen doesnt provide for the long-term needs of the plant. Slow-release fertilizers may reduce leaching loss of nutrients and may make the nutrients that they provide available over a period of time. Soil fertility is a process that involves the constant cycling of nutrients between organic and inorganic forms. As plant material and animal wastes are decomposed by micro-organisms, they release inorganic nutrients to the soil solution and those nutrients may then undergo further transformations which may be aided or enabled by soil micro-organisms. The balance between immobilization and mineralization processes depends on the balance and availability of nutrients and organic carbon to soil microorganisms. Natural processes such as lightning strikes may fix atmospheric nitrogen by converting it to, denitrification may occur under anaerobic conditions in the presence of denitrifying bacteria. Nutrient cations, including potassium and many micronutrients, are held in strong bonds with the negatively charged portions of the soil in a process known as cation exchange. In 2008 the cost of phosphorus as fertilizer more than doubled, recently the term peak phosphorus has been coined, due to the limited occurrence of rock phosphate in the world. Photosynthesis is the process whereby plants use light energy to chemical reactions which convert CO2 into sugars. As such, all plants require access to light and carbon dioxide to produce energy, grow and reproduce. While typically limited by nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium, low levels of carbon dioxide can act as a limiting factor on plant growth. Peer-reviewed and published studies have shown that increasing CO2 is highly effective at promoting plant growth up to levels over 300 ppm. Further increases in CO2 can, to a small degree
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Old English
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Old English or Anglo-Saxon is the earliest historical form of the English language, spoken in England and southern and eastern Scotland in the early Middle Ages. It was brought to Great Britain by Anglo-Saxon settlers probably in the mid 5th century, Old English developed from a set of Anglo-Frisian or North Sea Germanic dialects originally spoken by Germanic tribes traditionally known as the Angles, Saxons, and Jutes. As the Anglo-Saxons became dominant in England, their language replaced the languages of Roman Britain, Common Brittonic, a Celtic language, Old English had four main dialects, associated with particular Anglo-Saxon kingdoms, Mercian, Northumbrian, Kentish and West Saxon. It was West Saxon that formed the basis for the standard of the later Old English period, although the dominant forms of Middle. The speech of eastern and northern parts of England was subject to strong Old Norse influence due to Scandinavian rule, Old English is one of the West Germanic languages, and its closest relatives are Old Frisian and Old Saxon. Like other old Germanic languages, it is different from Modern English. Old English grammar is similar to that of modern German, nouns, adjectives, pronouns, and verbs have many inflectional endings and forms. The oldest Old English inscriptions were using a runic system. Old English was not static, and its usage covered a period of 700 years, from the Anglo-Saxon settlement of Britain in the 5th century to the late 11th century, some time after the Norman invasion. While indicating that the establishment of dates is a process, Albert Baugh dates Old English from 450 to 1150, a period of full inflections. Perhaps around 85 per cent of Old English words are no longer in use, Old English is a West Germanic language, developing out of Ingvaeonic dialects from the 5th century. It came to be spoken over most of the territory of the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms which became the Kingdom of England and this included most of present-day England, as well as part of what is now southeastern Scotland, which for several centuries belonged to the Anglo-Saxon kingdom of Northumbria. Other parts of the island – Wales and most of Scotland – continued to use Celtic languages, Norse was also widely spoken in the parts of England which fell under Danish law. Anglo-Saxon literacy developed after Christianisation in the late 7th century, the oldest surviving text of Old English literature is Cædmons Hymn, composed between 658 and 680. There is a corpus of runic inscriptions from the 5th to 7th centuries. The Old English Latin alphabet was introduced around the 9th century, with the unification of the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms by Alfred the Great in the later 9th century, the language of government and literature became standardised around the West Saxon dialect. In Old English, typical of the development of literature, poetry arose before prose, a later literary standard, dating from the later 10th century, arose under the influence of Bishop Æthelwold of Winchester, and was followed by such writers as the prolific Ælfric of Eynsham. This form of the language is known as the Winchester standard and it is considered to represent the classical form of Old English
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Germanic language
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It is the third most spoken Indo-European subdivision, behind Italic and Indo-Iranian, and ahead of Balto-Slavic languages. Limburgish varieties have roughly 1.3 million speakers along the Dutch–Belgian–German border, the main North Germanic languages are Norwegian, Danish, Swedish, Icelandic, and Faroese, which have a combined total of about 20 million speakers. The East Germanic branch included Gothic, Burgundian, and Vandalic, the last to die off was Crimean Gothic, spoken in the late 18th century in some isolated areas of Crimea. The total number of Germanic languages throughout history is unknown, as some of them—especially East Germanic languages—disappeared during or after the Migration Period. Proto-Germanic, along all of its descendants, is characterized by a number of unique linguistic features. Early varieties of Germanic enter history with the Germanic tribes moving south from Scandinavia in the 2nd century BC, to settle in the area of todays northern Germany, furthermore, it is the de facto language of the United Kingdom, the United States and Australia. It is also a language in Nicaragua and Malaysia. German is a language of Austria, Belgium, Germany, Liechtenstein, Luxembourg and Switzerland and has regional status in Italy, Poland, Namibia. German also continues to be spoken as a minority language by immigrant communities in North America, South America, Central America, Mexico, a German dialect, Pennsylvania Dutch, is still present amongst Anabaptist populations in Pennsylvania in the United States. Dutch is a language of Aruba, Belgium, Curaçao. The Netherlands also colonised Indonesia, but Dutch was scrapped as a language after Indonesian independence. Dutch was until 1925 an official language in South Africa, but evolved in and was replaced by Afrikaans, Afrikaans is one of the 11 official languages in South Africa and is a lingua franca of Namibia. It is used in other Southern African nations as well, low German is a collection of sometimes very diverse dialects spoken in the northeast of the Netherlands and northern Germany. Scots is spoken in Lowland Scotland and parts of Ulster, frisian is spoken among half a million people who live on the southern fringes of the North Sea in the Netherlands, Germany, and Denmark. Luxembourgish is mainly spoken in the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg, though it extends into small parts of Belgium, France. Limburgish varieties are spoken in the Limburg and Rhineland regions, along the Dutch–Belgian–German border, Swedish is also one of the two official languages in Finland, along with Finnish, and the only official language in the Åland Islands. Danish is also spoken natively by the Danish minority in the German state of Schleswig-Holstein, Norwegian is the official language of Norway. Icelandic is the language of Iceland, and is spoken by a significant minority in the Faroe Islands
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