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Australian Shield
The Australian Shield, also called the Western Australian Shield, is a geological feature known as a shield that occupies more than half of the continent of Australia. The word shield is used because it refers to ancient, molten rock which has cooled and solidified. The Australian Shield has a characteristic depth of and an estimated age of 2.8 to 3.5 billion years. In places younger sedimentary rock covers the shield's Precambrian surface. Extent It occupies the portion of Australia west of a line running north–south roughly from the eastern shore of Arnhem Land on the Bay or Gulf of Carpentaria to the Eyre Peninsula in the state of South Australia, and skirting to the west of the Simpson Desert in the interior. The plateau has an average elevation of between . The shield is fractured into a number of distinct blocks, including two cratons - the Pilbara Craton in the North and the Yilgarn Craton in the Southwest. These two cratons are the oldest part of the shield ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Precambrian
The Precambrian (or Pre-Cambrian, sometimes abbreviated pꞒ, or Cryptozoic) is the earliest part of Earth's history, set before the current Phanerozoic Eon. The Precambrian is so named because it preceded the Cambrian, the first period of the Phanerozoic Eon, which is named after Cambria, the Latinised name for Wales, where rocks from this age were first studied. The Precambrian accounts for 88% of the Earth's geologic time. The Precambrian is an informal unit of geologic time, subdivided into three eons ( Hadean, Archean, Proterozoic) of the geologic time scale. It spans from the formation of Earth about 4.6 billion years ago ( Ga) to the beginning of the Cambrian Period, about million years ago ( Ma), when hard-shelled creatures first appeared in abundance. Overview Relatively little is known about the Precambrian, despite it making up roughly seven-eighths of the Earth's history, and what is known has largely been discovered from the 1960s onwards. The Precambrian fossil ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Great Sandy Desert
The Great Sandy Desert is an interim Australian bioregion,IBRA Version 6.1 data located in the northeast of straddling the and southern Kimberley regions and extending east into the . It is the second largest desert in Australia after the |
Stuart Range, South Australia
The Stuart Range is a low upland in central South Australia, extending about with a north-west to south-east alignment and passing within to the south-east of Coober Pedy. Name The range is named after John McDouall Stuart, the first European explorer to pass through the area, in 1858. Formation During the Late Cretaceous and Tertiary, central Australia experienced crustal compression resulting in very broad, low-amplitude folding, and the Stuart Range formed on a basement upwarp. Underlying the Stuart Range, the folded sediments include the Early Cretaceous (Aptian-Albian) Bulldog Shale, consisting of grey marine mudstones. Where the Bulldog Shale has been exposed at the surface for long periods it has been subjected to deep chemical weathering, resulting in bleaching and the "multi-hued, picturesque colouration" found in the Arckaringa-Stuart Range landscape. The prolonged chemical weathering also dissolved silica which, transported through the regolith by the movement of ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Northern Territory
The Northern Territory (commonly abbreviated as NT; formally the Northern Territory of Australia) is an states and territories of Australia, Australian territory in the central and central northern regions of Australia. The Northern Territory shares its borders with Western Australia to the west (129th meridian east), South Australia to the south (26th parallel south), and Queensland to the east (138th meridian east). To the north, the territory looks out to the Timor Sea, the Arafura Sea and the Gulf of Carpentaria, including Western New Guinea and other islands of the Indonesian archipelago. The NT covers , making it the third-largest Australian federal division, and List of country subdivisions by area, the 11th-largest country subdivision in the world. It is sparsely populated, with a population of only 249,000 – fewer than half as many people as in Tasmania. The largest population center is the capital city of Darwin, Northern Territory, Darwin. The archaeological hist ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
MacDonnell Ranges
The MacDonnell Ranges, or Tjoritja in Arrernte, is a mountain range located in southern Northern Territory. MacDonnell Ranges is also the name given to an interim Australian bioregion broadly encompassing the mountain range, with an area of .IBRA Version 6.1 data The range is a long series of mountains in central , consisting of parallel ridges running to the east and west of . The mountain range contains many spectacular gaps and gorges as well as areas of A ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Perth, Western Australia
Perth is the capital and largest city of the Australian state of Western Australia. It is the fourth most populous city in Australia and Oceania, with a population of 2.1 million (80% of the state) living in Greater Perth in 2020. Perth is part of the South West Land Division of Western Australia, with most of the metropolitan area on the Swan Coastal Plain between the Indian Ocean and the Darling Scarp. The city has expanded outward from the original British settlements on the Swan River, upon which the city's central business district and port of Fremantle are situated. Perth is located on the traditional lands of the Whadjuk Noongar people, where Aboriginal Australians have lived for at least 45,000 years. Captain James Stirling founded Perth in 1829 as the administrative centre of the Swan River Colony. It was named after the city of Perth in Scotland, due to the influence of Stirling's patron Sir George Murray, who had connections with the area. It gained city stat ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Darling Range
The Darling Scarp, also referred to as the Darling Range or Darling Ranges, is a low escarpment running north–south to the east of the Swan Coastal Plain and Perth, Western Australia. The escarpment extends generally north of Bindoon, to the south of Pemberton. The adjacent Darling Plateau goes easterly to include Mount Bakewell near York and Mount Saddleback near Boddington. It was named after the Governor of New South Wales, Lieutenant-General Ralph Darling. History The feature was first recorded as General Darling Range by Charles Fraser, Government Botanist with Captain James Stirling aboard in March 1827. Maps from the 1830s show the scarp labelled " General Darlings Range"; this later became Darling Range, a name by which the formation was still commonly known in the late 20th century despite common understanding of it being an escarpment. There is also a tendency to identify the locations on or to the east of the scarp as being in the "Perth Hills" (or simpl ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Wunaamin-Miliwundi Ranges
The Wunaamin Miliwundi Ranges (formerly between 1879 and 2020, the King Leopold Ranges) are a range of hills in the western Kimberley region of Western Australia. There are two conservation parks within the ranges, the Wunaamin Conservation Park (in Wilinggin land) and Miluwindi Conservation Park (in Bunuba land), both formerly part of the King Leopold Ranges Conservation Park. Name The range was named on 6 June 1879 by the explorer Alexander Forrest, during an expedition in the Kimberley area, after King Leopold II of Belgium, "for the great interest taken by His Majesty in exploration". There had been several proposals and attempts to rename the range, given its link to Leopold II of Belgium, whose reign over the Congo Free State beginning in 1885 is claimed to have resulted in the deaths of 10 to 15 million African people. Leopold had no connection with Western Australia, but a number of geographic features in the Pilbara and Kimberley were named after European royalty. ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Hamersley Range
The Hamersley Range is a mountainous region of the Pilbara region of Western Australia. The range was named on 12 June 1861 by explorer Francis Thomas Gregory after Edward Hamersley (senior), Edward Hamersley, a prominent promoter of his exploration expedition to the northwest. Juukan Gorge lies within the ranges, as does Karijini National Park (formerly known as Hamersley Range National Park). History The Aboriginal Australians, traditional Aboriginal owners of the area that the range runs through are the Kurrama people, Puutu Kunti Kurrama and Pinikura peoples. In 1999 a small range within the Hamersley was named the Hancock Range after the Hancock family, who were pioneers in the area. The Hancock range is east of Karijini National Park in a region of broad valleys and peaks that rise to almost . The Hancock Range is close to Mulga Downs Station, a property owned by the Hancock family and where Lang Hancock is buried. Geography The range runs from the Fortescue River in ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Western Australia
Western Australia (commonly abbreviated as WA) is a state of Australia occupying the western percent of the land area of Australia excluding external territories. It is bounded by the Indian Ocean to the north and west, the Southern Ocean to the south, the Northern Territory to the north-east, and South Australia to the south-east. Western Australia is Australia's largest state, with a total land area of . It is the second-largest country subdivision in the world, surpassed only by Russia's Sakha Republic. the state has 2.76 million inhabitants percent of the national total. The vast majority (92 percent) live in the south-west corner; 79 percent of the population lives in the Perth area, leaving the remainder of the state sparsely populated. The first Europeans to visit Western Australia belonged to the Dutch Dirk Hartog expedition, who visited the Western Australian coast in 1616. The first permanent European colony of Western Australia occurred following the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Great Artesian Basin
The Great Artesian Basin (GAB), located in Australia, is the largest and deepest artesian basin in the world, stretching over , with measured water temperatures ranging from . The basin provides the only source of fresh water through much of inland Australia. The Basin underlies 22% of the continent, including the states and territories of Queensland (most of), the Northern Territory (the south-east corner of), South Australia (the north-east part of), and New South Wales (northern part of). The basin is deep in places and is estimated to contain of groundwater. The Great Artesian Basin Coordinating Committee (GABCC) GABCC website coordinates activity between the various levels of government and community organisations. Physiography This area is one of the distinct physiographic provinces of the larger |
Great Dividing Range
The Great Dividing Range, also known as the East Australian Cordillera or the Eastern Highlands, is a cordillera system in eastern Australia consisting of an expansive collection of mountain ranges, plateaus and rolling hills, that runs roughly parallel to the east coast of Australia and forms the fifth-longest land-based mountain chain in the world, and the longest entirely within a single country. It is mainland Australia's most substantial topographic feature and serves as the definitive watershed for the river systems in eastern Australia, hence the name. The Great Dividing Range stretches more than from Dauan Island in the Torres Strait off the northern tip of Cape York Peninsula, running the entire length of the eastern coastline through Queensland and New South Wales, then turning west across Victoria before finally fading into the Wimmera plains as rolling hills west of the Grampians region. The width of the Range varies from about to over .Shaw, John H., ''Col ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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