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Earth radius (denoted as R 🜨 or R E) is the distance from the center of Earth to a point on or near its surface. Approximating the figure of Earth by an Earth spheroid (an oblate ellipsoid), the radius ranges from a maximum (equatorial radius, denoted a) of nearly 6,378 km (3,963 mi) to a minimum (polar radius, denoted b) of nearly 6,357 km (3,950 mi).
History of the metre. An early definition of the metre was one ten-millionth of the Earth quadrant, the distance from the North Pole to the Equator, measured along a meridian through Paris. The history of the metre starts with the Scientific Revolution that is considered to have begun with Nicolaus Copernicus 's publication of De revolutionibus ...
The geological history of the Earth follows the major geological events in Earth's past based on the geological time scale, a system of chronological measurement based on the study of the planet's rock layers (stratigraphy). Earth formed about 4.54 billion years ago by accretion from the solar nebula, a disk-shaped mass of dust and gas left ...
t. e. Earth's circumference is the distance around Earth. Measured around the equator, it is 40,075.017 km (24,901.461 mi). Measured passing through the poles, the circumference is 40,007.863 km (24,859.734 mi). [1] Measurement of Earth's circumference has been important to navigation since ancient times. The first known scientific measurement ...
The flattening of the earth was estimated at 1/294.26 and the earth's equatorial radius was estimated at 6378360.7 metres. [ 116 ] In the early 19th century, the Paris meridian's arc was recalculated with greater precision between Shetland and the Balearic Islands by the French astronomers François Arago and Jean-Baptiste Biot .
The 1980 Geodetic Reference System (GRS 80) posited a 6 378 137 m semi-major axis and a 298.257222101 flattening. This system was adopted at the XVII General Assembly of the International Union of Geodesy and Geophysics (IUGG) in Canberra, Australia, 1979. The GRS 80 reference system was originally used by the World Geodetic System 1984 (WGS 84).
The Hill sphere (gravitational sphere of influence) of the Earth is about 1,500,000 kilometers (0.01 AU) in radius, or approximately four times the average distance to the Moon. [10] [nb 2] This is the maximal distance at which the Earth's gravitational influence is stronger than the more distant Sun and planets. Objects orbiting the Earth must ...
Jean Picard. Jean Picard (21 July 1620 – 12 July 1682) was a French astronomer and priest born in La Flèche, where he studied at the Jesuit Collège Royal Henry-Le-Grand. He is principally notable for his accurate measure of the size of the Earth, based on a careful survey of one degree of latitude along the Paris Meridian.