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Ancient oceans

Ancient oceans
Continental drift has reconfigured the Earth's oceans, joining and splitting ancient oceans to form the current oceans. Ancient oceans include:

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

Ocean rowing


Extraterrestrial oceans
Earth is the only known planet with liquid water on its surface, and is certainly the only such in our own solar system. However, liquid water is thought to be present under the surface of several natural satellites, particularly the Galilean moons of Europa, and, with less certainty, its fellows Callisto and Ganymede. Other icy moons may have once had internal oceans that have now frozen, such as Triton. The planets Uranus and Neptune may also possess large oceans of liquid water under their thick atmospheres, though their internal structure is not well understood at this time.

There is currently much debate over whether Mars once had an ocean of water in its northern hemisphere, and over what happened to it if it did; recent findings by the Mars Exploration Rover mission indicate it had some long-term standing water in at least one location, but its extent is not known.

Liquid hydrocarbons are thought to be present on the surface of Titan, though it may be more accurate to describe them as "lakes" rather than an "ocean". The distribution of these liquid regions will hopefully be better known after the full analysis of data from the Huygens probe of the Cassini-Huygens space mission, which dropped onto Titan's surface in January 2005. Titan is also thought likely to have a subterranean water ocean under the mix of ice and hydrocarbons that forms its outer crust.



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