Imaginary Lines: Latitude and Longitude

• Imaginary lines called parallels and meridians were created by earth scientists to better understand the Earth, with parallels encircling the planet from east to west.
• The equator is the longest horizontal imaginary line that divides the Earth into the northern and southern hemispheres, with other important parallels like the tropic of cancer, arctic circle in the northern hemisphere, and tropic of capricorn, antarctic circle in the southern hemisphere.
• The distance from any point on the planet to the equator is called latitude, measured in degrees from 0 to 90 for both northern (positive) and southern (negative) latitudes.
• Meridians are semi-circular imaginary lines running from the North Pole to the South Pole, with the Greenwich meridian being the most important, dividing the Earth into the eastern and western hemispheres.
• Longitude is the distance from any point on Earth to the Greenwich meridian, measured in degrees from 0 to 180 in both western (negative) and eastern (positive) hemispheres.

Learn about the geographic imaginary lines called parallels and meridians, their significance in dividing the Earth into hemispheres, and how latitude and longitude are measured based on these lines.