ANTARCTIC CONTINENT

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 Dictionary entry overview: What does Antarctic continent mean? 

• ANTARCTIC CONTINENT (noun)
  The noun ANTARCTIC CONTINENT has 1 sense:

1. an extremely cold continent at the south pole almost entirely below the Antarctic Circle; covered by an ice cap up to 13,000 feet deep

  Familiarity information: ANTARCTIC CONTINENT used as a noun is very rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• ANTARCTIC CONTINENT (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

An extremely cold continent at the south pole almost entirely below the Antarctic Circle; covered by an ice cap up to 13,000 feet deep

Classified under:

Nouns denoting natural objects (not man-made)

Synonyms:

Antarctic continent; Antarctica

Context example:

Antarctica is twice the size of Australia

Instance hypernyms:

continent (one of the large landmasses of the earth)

Meronyms (parts of "Antarctic continent"):

Adelie Coast; Adelie Land; Terre Adelie (a costal region of Antarctica to the south of Australia; noted for its large colonies of penguins)

Coats Land (a region of western Antarctica along the southeastern shore of the Weddell Sea)

Enderby Land (a region of Antarctica between Queen Maud Land and Wilkes Land; claimed by Australia)

Queen Maud Land (a region of Antarctica between Enderby Land and the Weddell Sea; claimed by Norway)

South Pole (the southernmost point of the Earth's axis)

Victoria Land (a mountainous area of Antarctica bounded by the Ross Sea and Wilkes Land)

Wilkes Land (a coastal region of Antarctica on the Indian Ocean to the south of Australia; most of the territory is claimed by Australia)

Admiralty Range (mountains in Antarctica to the north of Victoria Land)

Antarctic Peninsula; Palmer Peninsula (a large peninsula of Antarctica that extends some 1200 miles north toward South America; separates the Weddell Sea from the South Pacific)

Ross Sea (an arm of the southern Pacific Ocean in Antarctica)

Holonyms ("Antarctic continent" is a part of...):

Antarctic; Antarctic Zone; South Frigid Zone (the region around the south pole: Antarctica and surrounding waters)

 Context examples 

Most of the Antarctic continent is covered by the Antarctic Ice Sheet, which is up to four kilometres thick and contains enough ice to raise global sea levels by about 58 metres.

(Surface lakes cause Antarctic ice shelves to ‘flex’, The Titi Tudorancea Bulletin)

The Dry Valleys are a unique ecosystem within the Antarctic continent.

(Soot transported from elsewhere in world contributes little to melting of some Antarctic glaciers, National Science Foundation)

In all, the study found an overall ice discharge for the Antarctic continent of 1,929 gigatons per year in 2015, with an uncertainty of plus or minus 40 gigatons.

(New Study Brings Antarctic Ice Loss Into Sharper Focus, NASA)

Emperor penguins tend to build their colonies on ice with extremely specific conditions — it must be locked into the shoreline of the Antarctic continent, but close enough to open seawater to give the birds access to food for themselves and their young.

(Unless warming is slowed, emperor penguins will march toward extinction, National Science Foundation)

Data from the SOCCOM project are transforming our understanding of how ocean waters near the Antarctic continent and in the Southern Ocean influence ocean circulation on a global scale, says Alex Isern, head of the Antarctic Sciences Section in the Office of Polar Programs.

(Data from robotic drifters explain mysterious holes in Antarctic sea ice, National Science Foundation)