Today, scientists announced a new hominid fossil discovery in the Cradle of Humankind World Heritage Site in South Africa. The discovery is one of the most significant palaeoanthropological discoveries in recent times, revealing at least two partial hominid skeletons in remarkable condition, dating to between 1.78 and 1.95 million years. We are especially excited because Google Earth played a role in its discovery.
So how did this come about? Back in March 2008, Professor Lee Berger from Witswatersrand University in Johannesburg started to use Google Earth to map various known caves and fossil deposits identified by him and his colleagues over the past several decades, as it seemed the ideal platform by which to share information with other scientists. In addition, he also used Google Earth to locate new fossil deposits by learning to identify what cave sites looked like in satellite images.
At the beginning of this project, there were approximately 130 known cave sites in the region and around 20 fossil deposits. With the help of the navigation facility and high-resolution satellite imagery in Google Earth, Professor Berger went on to find almost 500 previously unidentified caves and fossil sites, even though the area is one of the most explored in Africa. One of these fossil sites yielded the remarkable discovery of a new species, Australopithecus sediba. This species was an upright walker that shared many physical traits with the earliest known species of the genus homo - and its introduction into the fossil record might answer some key questions about our earliest ancestry in Africa.
We're absolutely thrilled about this announcement, and delighted that our free mapping tools such as Google Earth and Google Maps continue to enable both individuals and distinguished scientists to explore and learn about their world. With these tools, places both foreign and familiar can be explored with the click of a mouse, allowing for new understandings of geography, topology, urbanism, development, architecture and the environment. Our efforts to organize the world's geographic information are ongoing - but at the end of the day, seeing the way these tools are put to use is what most inspires us.
Google has released new, higher-resolution satellite images of the Port-au-Prince area of Haiti that was devastated by a magnitude 7.0 earthquake on January 12.
The new impressively detailed photos were taken on Sunday, January 17 and have resolution of around six inches, according to Google. You can see the full set of images in Google Maps in the Satellite mode.
Last week, Google and GeoEye released a set of satellite images of Haiti taken on January 13, just a day after the earthquake, along with earlier images of the area from 2008.
Google is working to create the new imagery available as a layer in Google Earth as well. An updated Haiti earthquake layer for Google Earth is presently available with images from multiple sources as well as maps, including earthquake epicenters.
Now you can get a satellite's-eye view of the devastation in Haiti with Google Earth. Google worked with satellite imaging company GeoEye to put together a map layer file that provides up-close views of the wreckage of government buildings and extra in the Haitian capital city of Port-au-Prince.
Download the file to check it. It's in KML format, and it should load in Google Earth automatically if you have that desktop application installed. Alternatively, you can just pull it up in the web-based Google Maps application.
If you switch the layer on and off for some before-and-after perspective, you'll see just how serious the damage is - as if the pictures circulating on Twitter and additional places on the Internet weren't harrowing enough already. Here's an embed with the data to create things even easier.
Now, plenty of cars have built-in GPS navigation. But up until now, no car had Google Earth integrated, but at present Audi has remedied that with their new luxury car, the Audi A8.
Snugged right into the LCD screen in the car, the Google Earth application will let lucky owners look at 3D satellite imagery, terrain information, and even extra info layers such as Wikipedia articles or Panoramio images related to a certain location.
Audi A8's system will also feature Google Maps and Local Search, plus the ability to link it all with your desktop computer. To save time, you can just search for an address on your computer and send it to the car; when you start driving, the car will know where to go.
However, if you,re not familiar with German manufacturer's luxury cars, let's just say that only those with the deepest pockets will be buying one. The rest of us will have to make do with iPhone stand and the Google Earth mobile app.
Crowdsourcing is an increasingly popular way to tackle big problems - both Facebook and Google are taking this approach to translating the web into several languages.
Now Google is leveraging the wisdom of the crowds for another purpose: the Building Maker tool helps users make precise 3D models of buildings for representation in Google Earth.
Using Google-provided aerial photographs, you essentially overlay appropriate 3D shapes on top of several different views of a building to construct an exact model of it. When completed, submit your building to Google for review. If approved, the model will be added to the 3D Building layer in Google Earth.
For now, you can only construct buildings in fifty cities (dear Google: no Los Angeles? What gives?), but the company will be adding more over time. You don't have to be familiar with a building to create a decent model of it, though - and for geography and travel buffs it's a fun way to engage with different cities around the world.
Just like with the Monopoly City Streets "virtual" building initiative, you can use the free Google Sketch Up to edit or modify your creations, and the completed products will live in the Google 3D Warehouse, an online database of 3D models.
Check out the video demo of Building Maker below and let us know if you've had a chance to use the tool, or if you plan to. Have fun!
