Geographical Discoveries of the 20th Century: Identification Criteria, Dynamics, Role of the Institute of Geography RAS Staff

The analysis and synthesis of geographical discoveries on Earth in the XX century. The criteria allowing to reveal the most significant new data on a surface of the Earth influencing development of a civilization, economy and science are defined. The analysis includes about 350 discoveries. The place of the XX century in the system of periodization of geographical discoveries and their dynamics is determined. The most intensive discoveries were made in relatively peaceful years (in 1931–1940 and 1951–1960) in the polar regions and in the world ocean. The contribution to the world treasury of discoveries of employees of the Institute of geography of RAS is specified. They play a decisive role in the identification of regional centers of glaciation in Northern Eurasia, in the discovery of many subglacial morphostructures and lake Vostok in Antarctic, underwater elevations, ridges and troughs in the world ocean, lineaments, etc. Formal parameters – the interest of modern man (the number of requests in the Russian search system Yandex) defined hierarchy of discoveries of the XX century: the archipelago of Severnaya Zemlya in 1913 (132 mln hits); Centers of origin of cultivated plants, 1926–1939 years (103 mln); the origins of the Amazon river, 1996 (91 mln); the ring structure of the Earth, 1970 (83 mln); “Black smokers” on the ocean floor, 1977 (68 mln); modern glaciation of Northern Eurasia, 1929–1958 years (68 mln); Gamburtsev mountains in Antarctica, 1958 (65 mln); Chersky ridge in the NorthEast of Siberia, 1926 (63 mln), sources of the Nile river, 1937 (54 mln); lake Vostok in Antarctica, 1955–1996 (53 mln), etc. It is shown that the geographers of the ХХ century received the baton from the past centuries. Changing and studied in detail by field and remote methods, the planet in the XXI century becomes an arena for the study of the modern, “anthropocene” portrait of the world.

geographical discoveries, ocean, Arctic, Antarctica, terrestrial landforms, underwater ridges and troughs, marine fleet, glaciers, lineaments, centers of cultivated plants, aerospace sensing

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