However it exaggerated Antarctica and the distances between East Asia and North America, giving it a score of 4.563.Īmerican architect and inventor Buckminster Fuller's 'dymaxion' world map used a polyhedral net intended to be built as a 3D globe. The Winkel Tripel projection used an oblong shape with less distortions than the Mercator map. The well-known Mercator projection, which created a square map of the world by stretching the polar regions, received a score of 8.296 on their scale. The lower the score, the better the map, with a score of 0 being perfect. In 2007 Gott and Goldberg created a ranking system that gave every 2D map of the Earth a score for its accuracy based on how much it distorted key elements like distances and area. The new map is the latest example of years of research and critique by Gott and his colleagues on existing 2D maps of Earth. 'We believe it is the most accurate flat map of Earth yet,' they wrote in the study. The group published their efforts on the pre-print open access repository arXiv. Gott was joined by Princeton mathematician Robert Vanderbrei and physicist David Goldberg from Drexel University in Philadelphia to create the map. Gott, Vanderbei and Goldberg/Princeton University The group said they believed it was the most accurate 2-D map of the Earth ever produced. Richard Gott, Robert Vanderbei and David Goldberg. In comparison, the Mercator and Winkel Tripel projections have remarkably high distance errors near the poles and at the left and right edges of the map.Map by J. For instance, its configuration means distances can't be more or less than 22.2% of what they are in reality, Gott said. The pancake map also has smaller distance errors than any other 2D flat map. and South America are draped over the edge, like a sheet over a clothesline, but they're continuous.' 'If you're an ant, you can crawl from one side. If you want to measure distances from one hemisphere to the other, just use a string or a measuring tape to reach around the side of one pancake to the other, Gott said.

Either way, the map doesn't have any boundary cuts. The new map, published Feb.15 to the arXiv database, consists of two pancake maps that can be viewed side-by-side or back-to-back.

This led to the idea of a double-sided circular map, he said. In a 2019 study posted to the arXiv database, which has yet to be peer reviewed, Gott considered 'envelope polyhedra,' which involved gluing together regular shapes, back-to-back. Note the flat map on the wall in the background. Richard Buckminster Fuller holds his assembled polyhedral globe. For instance, Australia and Antarctica were too far apart on his creation. But while Fuller did a good job detailing the continents, he wasn't as exact with the oceans, which introduced errors. In 1943, the American architect Richard Buckminster Fuller drew outlines of regular shapes that made up a world map, and he wrote instructions for how his map could be folded into a polyhedral globe. The end result, the pancake map, borrowed ideas from previous research on polyhedra, or many-sided 3D shapes. 'We're proposing a radically different kind of map, and we beat Winkel Tripel on each and every one of the six errors.' To get around this boundary-splitting problem, the researchers approached mapmaking from a new perspective, with the hopes of designing a 'flat map with the least error possible,' Gott said. (Image credit: Photitos2016 via Getty Images) Notice how it distorts Antarctica and creates the illusion that Japan is very far away from California. The Winkel Tripel projection world map was first designed in 1921.

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