Sea


 This article does not cite any references or sources. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (June 2009)
This article may require cleanup to meet Wikipedia's quality standards. Please improve this article if you can. (May 2008)
This article is about the body of water. For other uses, see Sea (disambiguation) and SEA

The term sea refers to certain large bodies of water, but there is inconsistency as to its precise definition and application. Most commonly, a sea may refer to a large expanse of saline water connected with an ocean, but it is also used sometimes for a large saline lake that lacks a natural outlet, e.g. the Caspian Sea. Colloquially, the term is used as a synonym for ocean. Additionally, large lakes, such as the Great Lakes of North America, are occasionally referred to as "inland seas".

Contents

List of seas

Atlantic Ocean

Arctic Ocean

Antarctic Ocean

Indian Ocean

Pacific Ocean

Landlocked seas

(Alphabetical (June 2009))

Bodies of water and their sizes

Rank Body of water Square miles (square kilometres)
1 Pacific Ocean 64,196,000 sq mi (166,266,877 km²)
2 Atlantic Ocean 33,400,000 sq mi (86,505,603 km²)
3 Indian Ocean 28,400,000 sq mi (73,555,662 km²)
4 Arctic Ocean 5,100,000 sq mi (13,208,939 km²)
5 Arabian Sea 1,491,000 sq mi (3,861,672 km²)
6 South China Sea 1,148,000 sq mi (2,973,306 km²)
7 Caribbean Sea 971,000 sq mi (2,514,878 km²)
8 Mediterranean Sea 969,000 sq mi (2,509,698 km²)
9 Bering Sea 873,000 sq mi (2,261,060 km²)
10 Gulf of Mexico 582,000 sq mi (1,507,373 km²)
11 Sea of Okhotsk 537,000 sq mi (1,390,824 km²)
12 Sea of Japan 391,000 sq mi (1,012,685 km²)
13 Hudson Bay 282,000 sq mi (730,377 km²)
14 East China Sea 257,000 sq mi (665,627 km²)
15 Andaman Sea 218,100 sq mi (564,876 km²)
16 Red Sea 175,000 sq mi (453,248 km²)
17 North Sea 165,000 sq mi (427,348 km²)
18 Baltic Sea 147,000 sq mi (380,728 km²)
19 Yellow Sea 113,500 sq mi (293,964 km²)
20 Persian Gulf 88,800 sq mi (229,991 km²)
21 Gulf of California 59,000 sq mi (152,809 km²)

Nomenclature

  • The Sea of Galilee is a small freshwater lake with a natural outlet, which is called Lake Tiberias or Lake Kinneret on modern Israeli maps, but its original name remains in use.
  • The Sea of Cortés is more commonly known as the Gulf of California.
  • The Persian Gulf is a sea.
  • The Dead Sea is actually a lake, as is the Caspian Sea.

Science

The term "sea" has also been used in quantum physics. Dirac sea is an interpretation of positron emission states that comprises the vacuum.

See also

Sister project Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Seas
Sister project Look up maritime in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.
Sister project Look up sea in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.

References

.








stock | retire | vm
Why are we here?
All text is available under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License
This page is cache of Wikipedia. History