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3D map of Antarctica
Germany’s Alfred Wegener Institute, the Helmholtz Centre for Polar & Marine Research (AWI) and Dresden Technical University’s Instititute for Cartography have jointly produced a 3D map of the Antarctic continent and the seafloor of the Southern Ocean.
For the first time, it simultaneously depicts three geographic layers comprising the Antarctic ice sheet, the landmasses it conceals and the surrounding underwater landscape.
The map covers a total depth range of over 12,000 metres from the 4.800 metre-thick ice sheet down to the depths of the surrounding Southern Ocean. A major source of data has been the International Bathymetric Chart of the Southern Ocean (IBCSO), a digital representation of the entire Antarctic seafloor south of the 60th parallel released two years ago by the Alfred Wegener Institute. Bedmap2, a 3D digital map of Antarctica illustrating bedrock under the Antarctic ice sheet, provided a secondary key source. The new resulting true 3D map is said to be the first of its kind to combine the two datasets.
By David Goodfellow
