Antarctica is a continent encompassing the southern extremity of Earth, and containing the Earth's South Pole. It is surrounded by the Southern Ocean and divided in two by the Transantarctic Mountains.
It is considered to be the coldest, driest, windiest, and highest (on average) continent on Earth. Ice covers 98% of the continent; its 14 million kmē make it the fifth largest continent and the world's largest desert. There are no permanent human residents and only cold-adapted plants and animals survive there, including penguins, fur seals, lichens, and hundreds of types of algae. The name "Antarctica" comes from the Greek antarktikos, "opposite the Arctic.")
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