In stunning, up-close and personal detail, LIMA brings Antarctica to life, both for the scientific community and the general public at large. The U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) led the effort in cooperation with the National Aeronautics and Space Administration and the British Antarctic Survey to produce LIMA—the most geometrically accurate, virtually cloudless, seamless, and highest resolution image map of Antarctica. The National Science Foundation funded the project.

"LIMA represents a critical snapshot of the state of Antarctica's ice sheets, which contain over 60 of the world's freshwater and if melted would raise sea level by over 200 feet. But LIMA is also a fundamental tool for scientists. It will be used in every discipline from biology to geology to both answer scientific questions and plan fieldwork in the vast unexplored tracts of Antarctica," said Thomas Wagner, Program Director, Antarctic Earth Coordinator, National Science Foundation.

LIMA revolutionizes the ability of scientists to study Antarctica. Features are revealed in 10 times greater detail than ever before: objects roughly the size of half a basketball court are identifiable. Just as critical, all information is available for researchers and the general public to download at no charge.

Thousands of Landsat Antarctica scenes were evaluated to identify the cloud-free or least cloudy scenes used for LIMA. Each scene was corrected with elevation data and sun-angle correction to provide the best possible radiometric and geometrically accurate product for scientific use. Special mosaicking techniques were developed to merge the individual scenes into a seamless whole. The LIMA team pioneered use of embedded lightweight viewers in the LIMA Web site allowing for quick and easy pan and zoom tools as well as only three clicks to download data.

The LIMA Web site received 4 million hits in the first 12 hours after LIMA became available. View and download, at no charge, all of the LIMA products at http://lima.usgs.gov.

This section of LIMA includes McMurdo Station, the largest research base in Antarctica. Located at the tip of Hut Point Peninsula on Ross Island, McMurdo has been continually operated by the United States of America since 1956. Ross Island is roughly 72 km (45 mi) across (triangular shape in the middle of the image). Zoom in to see the ice runways just off to the right of McMurdo Station. Also visible are the Erebus Glacier Tongue (just below McMurdo), the Koettlitz and Ferrar Glaciers, the Royal Society Range, and the McMurdo Dry Valleys.

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