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hydrothermal vent

(Encyclopedia)hydrothermal vent, crack along a rift or ridge in the deep ocean floor that spews out water heated to high temperatures by the magma under the earth's crust. Some vents are in areas of seafloor spread...

whale

(Encyclopedia)whale, aquatic mammal of the order Cetacea, found in all oceans of the world. Members of this order vary greatly in size and include the largest animals that have ever lived. Cetaceans never leave the...

Baffin Bay

(Encyclopedia)Baffin Bay, ice-clogged body of water, c.700 mi (1,130 km) long, between Greenland and NE Canada. It connects with the Arctic Ocean to the north and west and with the Atlantic Ocean to the south by wa...

Krusenstern, Adam Johann von

(Encyclopedia)Krusenstern, Adam Johann von äˈdäm yōˈhän fən kro͞oˈzənshtĕrn [key], 1770–1846, Russian navigator. From 1803 to 1806 he circumnavigated the globe. Although the voyage was undertaken to st...

British Columbia

(Encyclopedia)CE5 British Columbia, province, 366,255 sq mi (948,600 sq km), including 6,976 sq mi (18,068 sq km) of water surface, W Canada. The Conservatives ...

Okinawa

(Encyclopedia)Okinawa ōˌkĭnäˈwä [key], island (1990 pop. 1,222,458), 454 sq mi (1,176 sq km), W Pacific Ocean, SW of Kyushu; a part of Okinawa prefecture, Japan. It is the largest of the Okinawa Islands in th...

Colorado, river, Argentina

(Encyclopedia)Colorado kōlōräˈᵺō [key], river, c.550 mi (885 km) long, rising from tributaries in the Andes and flowing SE across S central Argentina to the Atlantic Ocean. It marks the northern limit of Pat...

Howland Island

(Encyclopedia)Howland Island, uninhabited island (.73 sq mi/1.89 sq km), central Pacific near the equator, c.1,620 mi (2610 km) SW of Honolulu. The island was discovered by American traders and was claimed by the U...

Fresno

(Encyclopedia)Fresno frĕzˈnō [key], city (2020 pop. 546,770), seat of Fresno co., S central Calif.; inc....

Atacama Desert

(Encyclopedia)Atacama Desert ätäkäˈmä [key], arid region, c.600 mi (970 km) long, N Chile, extending south from the border of Peru. The desert itself, c.2,000 ft (610 m) above sea level, is a series of dry sal...