Part of the motivation behind National Geographic’s decision to name a fifth ocean, which was announced on World Oceans Day (June 8), was that giving a place a name can also give it status.

Corrections & clarifications: A prior version of this story misstated the name of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. For the first time in over a century, there's a new ocean on ...

The Pacific Ocean is the largest of the Earth's ocean basins, according to the National Ocean Service. It contains more than half of the free water on Earth, spanning around 63 million square miles .

National Geographic adds 5th ocean to world map. ... The change broke from guidance outlined by the International Hydrographic Organization, which standardizes sea mapping and official names.

A new map shows that human activity has heavily affected more than 40 percent of the world's oceans. Hardly any areas remain untouched. B.S. Halpern hide caption ...

But some countries, including the U.S., and institutions like the U.S. Board on Geographic Names, have officially adopted the Southern, or Antarctic, as the fifth ocean, according to National ...

A U.S.-French satellite that will map almost all of the world’s oceans, lakes and rivers rocketed into orbit Friday. The predawn launch aboard a SpaceX rocket from Vandenberg Space Force Base in ...

An international, interdisciplinary team of scientists shared the first results of the 2009-2013 Tara Oceans expedition on 22 May 2015 in a special issue of Science. On the basis of a portion of the ...

National Geographic, one of the world’s pre-eminent and most visible mapmaking groups, has officially decreed the existence of a fifth ocean. Called the Southern Ocean, it’s the body of water ...