LYCOS RETRIEVER 
Mercator Projection
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The Mercator Projection is a way of showing the earth on a flat map. With the equator at its center, the spacing of parallels of latitude increases with the distance from the equator. The Mercator Projection is named for its creator, Gerardus Mercator, the Flemish cartographer who was born on this date in 1512.
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The development of the Mercator projection represented a major breakthrough in the nautical cartography of the 16th century. However, it was much ahead of its time, since the old navigational and surveying techniques were not compatible with its use in navigation. Two main problems prevented its immediate application: the impossibility of determining the longitude at sea with adequate accuracy and the fact that magnetic directions, instead of geographical directions, were used in navigation. Only in the middle of the 18th century, after the marine chronometer was invented and the spatial distribution of magnetic declination was known, could the Mercator projection be fully adopted by navigators.
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Equidistance: The Mercator projection is not equidistant; there is no point from which all distances are shown accurately. The only places on the projection where true distances are accurately shown are along the projection's line(s) of tangency.
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The Space Oblique Mercator is a projection designed to show the curved ground-track of Landsat images. There is little distortion along the ground-track but only within the narrow band (about 15 degrees) of the Landsat image.
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L. G. JOERG--ON MAP PROPER FOR OF LOCATION tance from EARTHQUAKES stations various Mercator's on projection.2 maps The re- cently published von. by Glazer George Gallery, New York Map City. The Of World, On Projection, Mercators
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This poster shows a flattened (Mercator) projection of the Huygens probe's view from 10 kilometers altitude (6 miles). The images that make up this view were taken on Jan. 14, 2005, with the descent imager/spectral radiometer onboard the European Agency's Huygens probe.
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Mercator Projection