Ocean (from either Okeanos, a Greek god of sea & a body of water; Greek ωκεανός) covers almost threesome living quarters (71%) of the surface of the Earth, and about half of the globe's marine waters come concluded 3000 m deep.

This spherical, interconnected body of salt water, called the World Ocean, is divided per continents and archipelagos into a as punishment little joe bodies, from either a largest to the smallest: the Pacific Ocean, the Atlantic Ocean, the Indian Ocean, and a Arctic Ocean, and, based on data from occasionally authorities like International Hydrographic Organization(IHO), a fifth ocean, a Southern Ocean.

A few geographers & occasionally governments but not a U.s., recognize a IHO when defining official a lake person list & boundaries. (A America authority is the United States Board on Geographic Names.) a IHO officially sanctioned the Southern Ocean title sole inside 2000, but its definition by the line of latitude (with IHO members widely disputing which line of latitude) has left its acceptance as a fifth ocean open to wonder. A National Geographic Society & some other leading geographers and map maker prove my point to utilise "South Pacific", "South Atlantic", & "Indian" Ocean for the waters as much as Antarctica. Two or three Oceanographers recognize only iv oceans likewise, taking care of a Arctic Ocean (or even a Arctic Sea) as a a share of the Atlantic Ocean.

Little regions of the oceans come known as seas, gulfs, straits and other list.

Geologically, an ocean is an metropolitan area of pelagic crust covered by a river. Pelagic crust is the thinly layer of coagulated volcanic basalt that covers the Globe's mantle where there are no continents. From either this point of see, there are 3 "oceans" in todays world: a World Ocean, & the Black and Caspian Seas that were formed by the collision of Cimmeria with Laurasia. A Mediterranean Sea is very nearly its have "ocean", existence attached to the Globe Ocean through the Strait of Gibraltar, and indeed many days across a survive pack million years movement of the African Continent has closed the strait slay totally, making the Mediterranean a 4th "ocean". (A Black Sea is attached to the Mediterranean through the Bosporus, but this is effectively the natural canal, cut through continental rock occasionally 7000 years ago, such as than a piece of pelagic sea floor like the Strait of Gibraltar.)

A locality of the Globe Ocean is 361 million km², its volume is 1370 million km³, & its typical depth is 3790 m. About half of the globe's marine waters come complete 3000 m deep. This doesn't include seas non attached to a Globe Ocean, like the Caspian Sea.

A sum mass of the hydrosphere is astir Unity.Four × 10²¹ kilogram, ca. Cypher.023 % of the Globe's amount mass.

Understand sea water for a elaborate discussion of ocean water system composition, virtually all notably its salinity.

Exploration

Travel on the surface of the ocean through the utilize of boats dates back to prehistoric days, but only around modern days has extensive underwater travel get imaginable.

A deepest point in the ocean is the Mariana Trench located in a Pacific Ocean near the Northern Mariana Islands. It has the utmost depth of 10,923 m (35,838 ft) [http://www.rain.org/ocean/ocean-studies-challenger-deep-mariana-trench.html]. It was fully surveyed within 1951 by the British naval vessel, "Challenger II" which gave its title to a deepest a portion of the trench, the "Challenger Deep".

Lot of the bottom of the globe's oceans is undiscovered & chartless. The spherical image of numerous underwater features big than Decade klick was created inside 1995 based on gravitational distortions of the nearby sea surface.

Climate

One of a virtually all spectacular forms of weather occurs over a oceans: tropical cyclones (also known as "typhoons" & "hurricanes" ride in which a formulas forms). Ocean currents greatly affect Earth's climate by transferring warmly or even cold air & precipitation to coastal regions, in which it can be carried inland by winds. A Antarctic Circumpolar Current encircles that continent, influencing the vicinity's climate & connecting currents within many oceans.

Ecology

A oceans come front yard to the majority of plant and animal life on Earth. These lifeforms include:

fish cetacea such as whales, dolphins and porpoises, cephalopods such as a octopus crustaceans such as lobsters and shrimp marine worms plankton krill

Economy

the oceans come necessity to transport: a brobdingnagian part of the globe's goods come moved by ship between the world's seaports. Crucial ship canals include the Saint Lawrence Seaway, Panama Canal, and Suez Canal.

Ancient oceans

Continental drift has reconfigured the Globe's oceans, joining & splitting ancient oceans to form a todays oceans. Ancient oceans include:

Panthalassa, a brobdingnagian globe ocean that surrounded the Pangaea supercontinent. Tethys Ocean, a ocean between the ancient continents of Gondwana and Laurasia. Iapetus Ocean, the southern hemisphere ocean between Baltica and Avalonia.

Extraterrestrial oceans

Globe is a just knhave planet by using liquid a lake within its surface, & is sure as shooting the single such in my own solar system. All a same, liquid a water system is thought to become present under the surface of many natural satellites, particularly the Galilean moons of Europa, and, using less certainty, its fellows Callisto and Ganymede. More icy moons can stand it used to be that experienced internal oceans that use at times currently frozen, like Triton. A planets Uranus and Neptune may also possess big oceans of liquid fluids under their heavy atmospheres, though their internal structure is non swell understood at this instance.

There exists presently tremendously debate across whether Mars once had an ocean of a body of water around its northern hemisphere, & all over what happened to that whenever it did; recent findings per Mars Exploration Rover mission indicate it got a bit of long-long-run standing a lake within at least 1 location, however its extent is non known.

Liquid hydrocarbons come thought to become present on the surface of Titan, though it may be supplementary exact to describe the babies when "lakes" like than an "ocean". A distribution one liquid regions may hopefully become better known fallowing a to a full analysis of information from either the Huygens probe of the Cassini-Huygens space mission, which dropped onto Titan's surface in January 2005. Titan is too thought probably to have a subterranean a lake ocean under a mix of ice & hydrocarbons that forms its outer crust.

Oceans in film

In the picture show Muppet Treasure Island, a non-specific ocean is featured, & known as a "Big Blue Wet Thing".