Valleys, mountains, canyons and a vast, foreboding landscape are all geological features of Antarctica revealed in a new map, conceived by NASA scientist Robert Bindschalder.

This new map is called LIMA (Landsat Image Mosaic of Antarctica) and it shows clear images of areas as small as half of a basketball court. LIMA’s resolution is roughly 10 times better than any other map of the continent previously available.

This new map is also available to the public. It is explained on the Web site http://lima.nasa.gov. Viewers can zoom in and see precise details of Planet Earth’s most remote continent.

“Anyone with a computer and a Web connection can now travel to Antarctica,” says Bindschalder.

The Web site not only features images of the frozen continent, but is also interactive. It invites viewers to “meet Antarctica” by studying facts and information about this fascinating place.

The information that can be gleaned from this detailed map ranges from the geological structure and size of Antarctica, to the tremendous global impact the region has on the rest of our planet. For example, if global warming caused the continent’s massive ice sheets to melt, Earth’s water levels would increase by approximately 200 feet. Because the continent contains about 90 percent of the world’s ice, large-scale melting in Antarctica would cause changes all over the world.

The group of scientists who put together the map included researchers from NASA, the Geological Survey, the National Science Foundation, and the British Antarctic Survey. Researchers and geologists say the map will eventually be used for scientific explorations, charting rock formations, and monitoring changes in ice flows and other structures.

Scientists also stres–s the LIMA map’s importance for the International Polar Year. This field campaign studies the Arctic and Antarctic to better understand the environmental changes that are now occurring in these regions.

[Sources: The New York Times; http://lima.nasa.gov]