Labyrinth (Antarctica)
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Labyrinth (Antarctica)
The Labyrinth () is an extensive flat upland area which has been deeply eroded, at the west end of Wright Valley, in Victoria Land, Antarctica. It was so named by the Victoria University of Wellington Antarctic Expedition (1958–59) because the eroded dolerite of which it is formed gives an appearance of a labyrinth In Greek mythology, the Labyrinth (, ) was an elaborate, confusing structure designed and built by the legendary artificer Daedalus for King Minos of Crete at Knossos. Its function was to hold the Minotaur, the monster eventually killed by t .... See also * Jackson Pond References Plateaus of Antarctica Landforms of Victoria Land McMurdo Dry Valleys {{McMurdoDryValleys-geo-stub ...
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Wright Valley
The Wright Valley, named for Sir Charles Wright, is the central one of the three large Dry Valleys in the Transantarctic Mountains, located west of McMurdo Sound at approximately . Wright Valley contains the Onyx River, the longest river in Antarctica, Lake Brownworth, the origin of the Onyx River, and Lake Vanda, which is fed by the Onyx River. Its southwestern branch, ''South Fork'', is the location of Don Juan Pond. The upland area known as the Labyrinth is at the valley's west end. Although portions of the interconnected valley system were discovered in 1903 by the ''Discovery'' expedition led by Captain Robert Falcon Scott, the Wright Valley located near the centre of the system was not seen until aerial photographs of the region were made in 1947. By the mid 1960s scientists were becoming increasingly intrigued by the paradoxical fact that the valley lay immediately adjacent to the permanent East Antarctic Ice Sheet, yet had remained ice-free for at least thousands of y ...
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Victoria Land
Victoria Land is a region in eastern Antarctica which fronts the western side of the Ross Sea and the Ross Ice Shelf, extending southward from about 70°30'S to 78°00'S, and westward from the Ross Sea to the edge of the Antarctic Plateau. It was discovered by Captain James Clark Ross in January 1841 and named after Queen Victoria. The rocky promontory of Minna Bluff is often regarded as the southernmost point of Victoria Land, and separates the Scott Coast to the north from the Hillary Coast of the Ross Dependency to the south. The region includes ranges of the Transantarctic Mountains and the McMurdo Dry Valleys (the highest point being Mount Abbott in the Northern Foothills), and the flatlands known as the Labyrinth. The Mount Melbourne is an active volcano in Victoria Land. Early explorers of Victoria Land include James Clark Ross and Douglas Mawson. In 1979, scientists discovered a group of 309 meteorites in Antarctica, some of which were found near the Allan Hills in ...
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Victoria University Of Wellington Antarctic Expedition
The Antarctic Research Centre (ARC) is part of the School of Geography, Environment and Earth Sciences at Victoria University of Wellington. Its mission is to research "Antarctic climate history and processes, and their influence on the global climate system. The current director of the Antarctic Research Centre is Associate Professor Robert McKay. Directors * 1972 - 2007: Professor Peter Barrett * 2008 - 2016: Professor Tim Naish * 2017 - 2019: Professor Andrew Mackintosh * 2020 - Present: Professor Robert McKay History In December 1957, geology students Barrie McKelvey and Peter Webb along with biologist Ron Balham conducted an expedition to the then unexplored McMurdo Dry Valleys via the Royal New Zealand Navy Antarctic support ship HMNZS ''Endeavour''. This expedition formed the basic for the annual Victoria University of Wellington Antarctic Expeditions, which continue to the present day. Since this first expedition, over 400 staff and students have travelled to the ...
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Dolerite
Diabase (), also called dolerite () or microgabbro, is a mafic, holocrystalline, subvolcanic rock equivalent to volcanic basalt or plutonic gabbro. Diabase dikes and sills are typically shallow intrusive bodies and often exhibit fine-grained to aphanitic chilled margins which may contain tachylite (dark mafic glass). ''Diabase'' is the preferred name in North America, while ''dolerite'' is the preferred name in the rest of the English-speaking world, where sometimes the name ''diabase'' refers to altered dolerites and basalts. Some geologists prefer to avoid confusion by using the name ''microgabbro''. The name ''diabase'' comes from the French ', and ultimately from the Greek - meaning "act of crossing over, transition". Petrography Diabase normally has a fine but visible texture of euhedral lath-shaped plagioclase crystals (62%) set in a finer matrix of clinopyroxene, typically augite (20–29%), with minor olivine (3% up to 12% in olivine diabase), magnetite (2%), and ...
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Labyrinth
In Greek mythology, the Labyrinth (, ) was an elaborate, confusing structure designed and built by the legendary artificer Daedalus for King Minos of Crete at Knossos. Its function was to hold the Minotaur, the monster eventually killed by the hero Theseus. Daedalus had so cunningly made the Labyrinth that he could barely escape it after he built it. Although early Cretan coins occasionally exhibit branching (multicursal) patterns, the single-path (unicursal) seven-course "Classical" design without branching or dead ends became associated with the Labyrinth on coins as early as 430 BC, and similar non-branching patterns became widely used as visual representations of the Labyrinth – even though both logic and literary descriptions make it clear that the Minotaur was trapped in a complex branching maze. Even as the designs became more elaborate, visual depictions of the mythological Labyrinth from Roman times until the Renaissance are almost invariably unicursal. Branching ma ...
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Jackson Pond
Jackson Pond is a freshwater frozen pond midway between the terminus of Wright Upper Glacier and Anvil Pond in the Labyrinth, McMurdo Dry Valleys, Antarctica. It was named by the Advisory Committee on Antarctic Names in 2004 after J.K. Jackson of the Department of Geology at Northern Illinois University Northern Illinois University (NIU) is a public research university in DeKalb, Illinois. It was founded as Northern Illinois State Normal School on May 22, 1895, by Illinois Governor John P. Altgeld as part of an expansion of the state's system ..., DeKalb, Illinois, a member of the core legging and processing team during the McMurdo Dry Valleys Drilling Project, 1974–75. References Lakes of Victoria Land McMurdo Dry Valleys {{McMurdoDryValleys-geo-stub ...
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Plateaus Of Antarctica
In geology and physical geography, a plateau (; ; ), also called a high plain or a tableland, is an area of a highland consisting of flat terrain that is raised sharply above the surrounding area on at least one side. Often one or more sides have deep hills or escarpments. Plateaus can be formed by a number of processes, including upwelling of volcanic magma, extrusion of lava, and erosion by water and glaciers. Plateaus are classified according to their surrounding environment as intermontane, piedmont, or continental. A few plateaus may have a small flat top while others have wide ones. Formation Plateaus can be formed by a number of processes, including upwelling of volcanic magma, extrusion of lava, Plate tectonics movements and erosion by water and glaciers. Volcanic Volcanic plateaus are produced by volcanic activity. The Columbia Plateau in the north-western United States is an example. They may be formed by upwelling of volcanic magma or extrusion of lava. The un ...
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Landforms Of Victoria Land
A landform is a natural or anthropogenic land feature on the solid surface of the Earth or other planetary body. Landforms together make up a given terrain, and their arrangement in the landscape is known as topography. Landforms include hills, mountains, canyons, and valleys, as well as shoreline features such as bays, peninsulas, and seas, including submerged features such as mid-ocean ridges, volcanoes, and the great ocean basins. Physical characteristics Landforms are categorized by characteristic physical attributes such as elevation, slope, orientation, stratification, rock exposure and soil type. Gross physical features or landforms include intuitive elements such as berms, mounds, hills, ridges, cliffs, valleys, rivers, peninsulas, volcanoes, and numerous other structural and size-scaled (e.g. ponds vs. lakes, hills vs. mountains) elements including various kinds of inland and oceanic waterbodies and sub-surface features. Mountains, hills, plateaux, and plains are ...
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