The atlas

Two ways down

The whole site, sorted into sixteen collections. Go down through the planet, from the edge of space to the centre of the core, or back through time, from today to the first solid grains of the Solar System.

34 written 135 in outline, being written

Down through the planet

Space

  1. Space environment

    The Sun, the solar wind and the shield around us

    0 written, 12 in outline

    12 pieces in outline
  2. Atmosphere

    The air, and how it came to have oxygen in it

    1 written, 11 in outline

    All 12 pieces
  3. Oceans and water

    The sea, the sea floor and the water cycle

    2 written, 10 in outline

    All 12 pieces
  4. Ecology

    Living things and the places they live

    0 written, 12 in outline

    12 pieces in outline
  5. Human impact

    What we are changing, and how we know

    0 written, 10 in outline

    10 pieces in outline
  6. Landforms

    Mountains, valleys and coasts, and what made them

    1 written, 9 in outline

    All 10 pieces
  7. Natural hazards

    When the ground shakes, erupts or floods

    3 written, 7 in outline

    All 10 pieces
  8. Rocks and minerals

    What the ground is made of, and what it records

    1 written, 9 in outline

    All 10 pieces
  9. Plate tectonics

    The moving plates that carry the continents

    4 written, 6 in outline

    All 10 pieces
  10. Interior

    Crust, mantle and core, down 6,371 km

    3 written, 8 in outline

    All 11 pieces

The centre, 6,371 km down

Back through time

Now

  1. Climate history

    Hothouses, ice ages and the climate we have now

    1 written, 7 in outline

    All 8 pieces
  2. Fossils and extinction

    How life gets into the rocks, and how it vanishes

    2 written, 10 in outline

    All 12 pieces
  3. Prehistoric life

    The animals and plants of lost worlds

    5 written, 5 in outline

    All 10 pieces
  4. Geological time

    How deep time is measured, named and dated

    3 written, 6 in outline

    All 9 pieces
  5. Origins

    How the Earth and the Moon began

    1 written, 8 in outline

    All 9 pieces

4,567 million years ago

After the last ice age, the story carries on in people: see Our Centuries, our sister site on human history.