Galway, Ireland

Earth & Ocean Sciences

Language: English Studies in English
Subject area: physical science, environment
University website: www.nuigalway.ie/
Earth
Earth is the third planet from the Sun and the only object in the Universe known to harbor life. According to radiometric dating and other sources of evidence, Earth formed over 4.5 billion years ago. Earth's gravity interacts with other objects in space, especially the Sun and the Moon, Earth's only natural satellite. Earth revolves around the Sun in 365.26 days, a period known as an Earth year. During this time, Earth rotates about its axis about 366.26 times.
Ocean
An ocean (from Ancient Greek Ὠκεανός, transc. Okeanós, the sea of classical antiquity) is a body of saline water that composes much of a planet's hydrosphere. On Earth, an ocean is one of the major conventional divisions of the World Ocean. These are, in descending order by area, the Pacific, Atlantic, Indian, Southern (Antarctic), and Arctic Oceans. The word sea is often used interchangeably with "ocean" in American English but, strictly speaking, a sea is a body of saline water (generally a division of the world ocean) partly or fully enclosed by land.
Earth
In this broad earth of ours,
Amid the measureless grossness and the slag,
Enclosed and safe within its central heart,
Nestles the seed perfection.
Walt Whitman, Song of the Universal, in Leaves of Grass
Earth
For naught so vile that on the earth doth live,
But to the earth some special good doth give.
William Shakespeare, Romeo and Juliet (1597), Act II, scene iii.
Earth
And again, observe ye the days of summer how the sun is above the earth over against it. And you seek shade and shelter by reason of the heat of the sun, and the earth also burns with growing heat, and so you cannot tread on the earth, or on a rock by reason of its heat.
Book of Enoch, Chapter 4, translated by Robert Charles, 1917.
Although forests are dynamic systems, the speed of change to which they are subjected is now at an unprecedented level. This is due to factors such as climate change, nitrogen deposition, the introduction of invasive species, and the loss of biodiversity and habitat.
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