Where was your house millions of years ago?
A virtual geochronological globe where you can see how the surface of our planet looked in different eras (Neo-Proterozoic, Paleozoic, Mesozoic, Cenozoic), starting from a time period of 750 million years ago.
This project (visualization and support) was created by Ian Webster (computer science specialist from Mountain View, California, USA).
In his decision, the data are used:
- of the PALEOMAP project (tectonic and paleogeographic maps). Link to the globalgeology project and database .
- LocationIQ project (address search tool).
Some elements of the visualization are not adjusted in time (for example, the position of clouds and stars). The coloring of the cartographic materials used in the project is based on data on heights and surface topography (darker - lower, lighter - higher than altitude), the accuracy of determining the location of the desired settlement is ~ 100 km.
Using this virtual globe, it is proposed to visually trace changes in tectonic, climatic and evolutionary activity on Earth in different years of its life, to see the vector of formation of the main contours of modern continents and mountain building.
Red bar on the right - these frames are implemented in the project:
Link to the online globe "Ancient Earth" .
The project currently implements two scales:
- temporary with 26 choices (from 0 to 750 million years ago);
- event with 20 choices from global natural phenomena (the appearance of the first cereals, the first insects, the first crustaceans).
The highlight of this visual solution is the opportunity ... to find out exactly where on the planet your hometown would be located millions of years ago.
You need to fill in the line in the special field in the upper left corner of the page - in Latin write the name of the settlement and choose from the proposed options.
And now you can see what the surface of the Earth and its plot looked like in the place where your hometown would be, and even during the appearance of the first flowers, for example.
By pressing the buttons (arrows) on the keyboard left and right, you can see how the relief of the planet with this place has changed at different times.
By the way, I found an interesting bug: if after choosing a city and the appearance of a point, you start choosing a second and so on city, then the number of points will increase, for example, with 4 cities (Moscow, Rostov-on-Don, Yekaterinburg and Novosibirsk):