History of earth science

This map has a history of nearly 4500 years. In the next article, we will introduce the origin and development of maps in detail. The origin of maps can be traced back to 4500 years ago, and people began to describe the original spatial images of the surrounding environment in various ways. At that time, maps were made of pottery, papyrus, copperplate, coconut branches, stones, animal skins and so on. The oldest preserved map is the map drawn by Babylonians on pottery tablets from the 25th century BC to the 23rd century BC.

The needs of social development and practice, especially the seasonal flooding of the Nile in Egypt and the birth of geometry; The application of irrigation and water conservancy, Pythagorean theorem, ruler and other surveying and mapping instruments in the lower Yellow River plain in China has promoted the development of maps. China's Guanzi Map is the earliest monograph on the geographical content of maps. The map of the Western Han Dynasty unearthed in Mawangdui shows that the theory and technology of ancient cartography in China have reached a considerable level. At that time, the compilation of eastern and western maps and the development of cartography clearly reflected the different geographical environments of ocean and mainland, as well as the needs of agricultural and maritime trade.

In the 4th century BC, Aristotle proved that the earth is spherical. Later, someone began to measure the circumference of the earth, and a cylindrical map projection appeared. In the second century AD, Ptolemy compiled a Geographic Guide with 27 maps of the world, and reprinted 50 editions, which influenced the West 1000. In the 3rd century A.D., Pei Xiu of China compiled the Map of Gong Yu Area and the Topographic Abbot Map, and put forward "Six-body Surveying and Mapping", which was the most incisive exposition of the principle of ancient surveying and mapping in China, and formed a unique map technology method in the East, which also influenced China for nearly a thousand years.

Ptolemy and Pei Xiu, two ancient cartographers, established the longitude and latitude lines and the grid to describe the geographical position according to the mathematical rules, which are still the mathematical basis of the map. Through the communication between the east and the west in the16th century, two coordinate systems appeared on the same map at the same time. On the French topographic map, the square network on the map of China appeared; The unified map of China in Qing Dynasty adopted the longitude and latitude lines on the western map.

From 1405 to 1433, Zheng He, a China navigator, made seven voyages to the West. Zheng He's Nautical Chart, which reflects Zheng He's voyage to the West, is the most detailed ancient nautical chart in China and the earliest nautical chart in the world. Since then, with the maritime exploration and maritime hegemony of Portugal, Spain, the Netherlands and Britain, nautical charts have also developed rapidly.

1569, Mercator designed isometric cylindrical projection with positive axis, which showed the known range of the eastern and western hemispheres on a map for the first time. This projection map can guide navigators in a straight line and is widely used in nautical charts. It was named "Mercator Projection" and later published an atlas named after him. With the needs of aerospace, various horizontal and inclined Mercator projections appear one after another. Mercator's work is known as the milestone of European cartography in16th century. His atlas created a new projection of the whole world map, reflecting the characteristics of the development of European maps at that time.

Contemporary with Mercator, the founder of Oriental Atlas was Luo Hongxian of China. He inherited and developed Zhu Siben's map, and completed the earliest existing atlas of Yu Tu in China. Atlas adopts 24 unified legend symbols, and geometric patterns replace pictograms, which is an improvement in atlas design. Both Luo Hongxian and Mercator summarized the historical achievements of the maps of the East and the West before16th century in the form of atlases, which linked the past with the future and had an impact on the development of maps in later centuries.

Matteo Ricci, an Italian missionary, made an important contribution to the exchange of cartography between the East and the West. After 1600 AD, with the support and cooperation of China scholars, he used the knowledge of world geography in the West and the East to compile a great map of the world. Icons include newly discovered regional concepts such as oceans and continents, as well as Chinese translations of Mediterranean, Rome, Cuba and Canada. At the same time, the terms such as South Pole, North Pole and Equator used in Zhang Heng's armillary sphere are applied to the map.

/kloc-After the 0/7th century, European countries experienced the industrial revolution and made great social and economic development. In order to explore the maritime trade route and expand the colony, both charts and measured topographic maps are needed to meet the needs of developing industrial and mining resources and land resources, as well as military wars. Therefore, large-scale topographic mapping carried out by various countries has become the mainstream of modern cartography.

179 1 year, the British army survey bureau was established. After that, western European countries successively established national institutions to study and compile maps, formed a large-scale professional team and standardized technical system, and successively completed local large-scale topographic mapping, such as Du Fu topographic map in Switzerland, which is famous for its exquisiteness and delicacy.

After the European mapping technology was introduced into China, the Qing Dynasty drew the imperial map and the unified map of the Qing Dynasty, which laid the scientific foundation for the modern map of China. /kloc-In the middle of the 9th century, China drew a relatively perfect map of Asia by trapezoidal projection.

1909, the international geographical congress made unified regulations on map framing, terrain representation, town classification, place name pinyin, etc. Later, the color setting of the layer and the standard of metric units were revised, and a unique map projection and a global unified framing number were drawn up. These measures have had a far-reaching impact on the internationalization and standardization of maps, and most countries have also accepted the international unified framing number of maps. Significant progress has been made in the international cooperative compilation and classification of geological maps, population maps, land use maps, forest maps and soil maps, and in the standardization of legend systems. Maps have entered the stage of industrialized production and socialized commercialization.

With the division of natural science and the deepening of inland exploration, new fields of thematic maps are constantly being explored. At the end of 19, the natural atlas reprinted in Germany included maps of geology, ocean, meteorology, geomagnetism, plants, animals and races, reflecting the scientific and technological level at that time. On the basis of predecessors, Yang Shoujing of China compiled this historical map in 15 years, which reflected the rich heritage of China's historical geography and solved many disputes about waterway changes and state and county migration.

Cartography in the 20th century, on the one hand, inherited rich historical traditions; On the other hand, there is a new development, that is, the direction of comprehensive surveying and mapping. The content of the map emphasizes the interaction between natural complex and socio-economic environment, focusing on the relationship between man and land and environmental ecological effects. With the emergence of aerial photography, satellite remote sensing and computer mapping, comprehensive mapping has received strong technical support and cartography has undergone historic changes.

1932 used aerial photography for the first time, which enabled people to use high-altitude platforms for surveying and mapping without the ground, and fundamentally changed the production process of topographic surveying and mapping formed in the past 300 years. Aerial photogrammetry almost completely replaces the classical flat-panel mapping, and is widely used in the mapping of national basic topographic maps and various large-scale maps of cities, farmland water conservancy and forest mines.

Aerial photos are rich in information, and multi-spectral images can be obtained by using infrared, natural color, false color infrared and microwave. Through interpretation or image processing, it is used to compile various thematic maps such as geology, soil, land use and forest resources. Aerial photography also transcends the obstacles of geographical environment, especially the ocean beaches that are difficult for human beings to move. Marshes, lakes, mountains and deserts, so as to obtain the geographical data of blank areas not covered by the original topographic map.

As an objective image record of geographical landscape, aerial photography provides a unified information source for the compilation of series of maps, reflecting the distribution and relationship of various natural and human geographical elements in the same space. Series mapping fundamentally solves the difficulty of unified coordination of departmental thematic mapping. For example, during the period from1969 to1979, Mexico completed a series of topographic, geological, land use, soil and land potential maps of1:500,000, and established a systematic national land archive.

1972, the world's first earth resource survey satellite was successfully launched, enabling human beings to observe the whole earth from outer space. As new map information sources, land satellites, meteorological satellites and marine satellites have the remarkable characteristics of fast, quasi-synchronous and large-area coverage, which can provide unprecedented information and make cartography show new development.

In 1970s, cartography entered the information age marked by the introduction of computers. In order to meet the needs of computers and information transmission tools and facilitate output, input, processing, storage and updating, new forms of digital information began to appear on maps. Map synthesis theory and quantitative research have essentially solved the problems of map capacity and clarity. With the help of the results of geographical quantity method, it opens the way for computer-aided map drawing. With the rapid development of computer-aided cartography, it has entered the application stage from the experimental stage. It uses the software system to solve the map projection transformation, scale scaling and the selection and synthesis of map geographical elements, and realizes the automation of map editing. Many countries have established map databases.

On the basis of topographic map database, countries such as Europe, America and Japan have further developed geographic information systems. This kind of system has multi-dimensional information compound function, including socio-economic statistics, ground observation station network records, geophysical field data, multi-temporal remote sensing data, as well as a variety of professional mathematical analysis models or map expert systems, with mathematical simulation testing and forecasting functions. Up to now, map is not only an information carrier to describe and express the distribution law of geographical phenomena, but also the result of regional comprehensive analysis and research, that is, the intelligent product output by geographic information system. Geographic information system provides modern technical support for the regional and comprehensive research of cartography.