Images

The pockmarked terrain of Pinacate National Park in Mexico's Sonora Province is evidence of a violent past. Among hundreds of volcanic vents and cinder cones are rare maar craters, formed when rising magma met underground water to create pockets of steam that blew nearly circular holes in the overlying crust.

Several hundred kilometers southeast of Buenos Aires, Cabo San Antonio juts out into the Atlantic Ocean along the Argentinean coast.

Along the southern coast of the Netherlands, sediment-laden rivers have created a massive delta of islands and waterways in the gaps between coastal dunes. After unusually severe spring tides devastated this region in 1953, the Dutch built an elaborate system of dikes, canals, dams, bridges, and locks to hold back the North Sea.

After beginning in northern British Columbia and flowing through Yukon in Canada, the Yukon River crosses Alaska, USA, before emptying into the Bering Sea. Countless lakes, sloughs, and ponds are scattered throughout this scene of the Yukon Delta. The river's sinuous, branching waterways seem like blood vessels branching out to enclose an organ.

Elusive, but ecologically vital, Namibia's Ugab River only flows above ground for a few days each year. The subterranean waters underlying this ephemeral river, however, are shallow enough in places to fill hollows and sustain a wildlife population that includes the rare desert elephant.

Rising unexpectedly from the heart of the Namib Desert in northern Namibia, the Brandberg Massif is an exhumed granite intrusion. Unique plant and animal communities thrive in its high-altitude environment, and prehistoric cave paintings decorate walls hidden in its steep cliffs.

This satellite mosaic of the Hoosier State was created from several Landsat scenes stitched together to create one seamless image. Data from the National Elevation Dataset (NED) is also incorporated into the image. The names of major cities and county boundaries have been added.

A giant whirlpool cloud, coaxed into shape by high-altitude winds, swirls above the sea between Spain and Morocco.

142 million years ago, an asteroid or comet slammed into what is now the Missionary Plains in Australia's Northern Territory, forming a crater 24 kilometers in diameter and 5 kilometers deep. Today, like a bull's eye, the circular ring of hills that defines Gosses Bluff stands as a stark reminder of the event.

Like distant galaxies amid clouds of interstellar dust, chunks of sea ice drift through graceful swirls of grease ice in the frigid waters of Foxe Basin near Baffin Island in the Canadian Arctic. Sea ice often begins as grease ice, a soupy slick of tiny ice crystals on the ocean's surface.

As air flows over and around objects in its path, spiraling eddies, known as Von Karman vortices, may form. The vortices in this image were created when prevailing winds sweeping east across the northern Pacific Ocean encountered Alaska's Aleutian Islands.

Named after the ancient Mayan Province of Kimpech, the state of Campeche comprises much of the western half of Mexico's Yucatan Peninsula. Rivers in southern Campeche drain into the immense Terminos Lagoon, the entrance to which is protected by a long barrier island, Isla Del Carmen.

A vast alluvial fan blossoms across the desolate landscape between the Kunlun and Altun mountain ranges that form the southern border of the Taklimakan Desert in China’s XinJiang Province.

Like dark fingers, cold ocean waters reach deeply into the mountainous coastline of northern Norway, defining the fjords for which the country is famous. Flanked by snow-capped peaks, some of these ice-sculpted fjords are hundreds of meters deep.

Mimicking a cubist collage, linear windbreaks of densely planted trees surround farmsteads in this winter landscape near the city of Komsomolets in Northern Kazakhstan.

The mountainous outcrops of Jebel Auenat rise 6000 feet above the barren, uninhabited plains of the Libyan Desert. The frontiers of Libya, Egypt and Sudan meet amidst the rugged granite of Jebel Auenat. The mountains are remnants of an ancient granitic dome. Rivers of sand meander around them, swept across the desert pavement by northeasterly winds.

The eastern side of Russia's Kamchatka Peninsula juts into the Pacific Ocean west of Alaska. In this winter image, a volcanic terrain is hidden under snow-covered peaks and valley glaciers feed blue ice into coastal waters.

Steep-sided volcanic cones along the Chilean-Argentinean border add texture to this "study in blues." Of approximately 1,800 volcanoes scattered across this region, 28 are active.

Like a many-faceted jewel fashioned in an indigo setting, the Shetland Islands lie 210 kilometers north of the Scottish mainland in the North Atlantic Ocean. Despite their 60 degree north latitude, the Shetlands enjoy a relatively temperate climate thanks to the warming influence of the Gulf Stream.

Vivid colors belie the arid landscape of northern Chile where the Atacama Desert, one of the world's driest, meets the foothills of the Andes. Here salt pans and gorges choked with mineral-streaked sediments give way to white-capped volcanoes.

Like sweeping brushstrokes of pink and green, the Belcher Islands meander across the deep blue of Canada's Hudson Bay. The islands' only inhabitants live in the small town of Sanikiluaq, near the upper end of the middle island. Despite the green hues in this image, these rocky islands are too cold to sustain more than a smattering of low-growing vegetation.