Paleomap PC: Plate tectonic reconstructions on IBM compatible computers

PALEOMAP-PC (PMAPPC) allows users to interactively view Phanerozoic plate reconstructions on IBM compatible personal computers. This software compliments Macintosh and Unix software developed to conjunction with the PALEOMAP Project at the University of Texas at Arlington. The past positions of the continents can be viewed on the PC monitor in a variety of map projections including the spherical projection which gives a 3-D perspective of the Earth. Once a reconstruction time has been entered, the total finite rotations for over 150 independently moving plates are calculated and the plates are rotated back through time and drawn in reconstructed coordinates. The user can zoom in and out focusing on particular areas of interest. Hard copy output is available to a variety of output devices, both as a screen dump utility and as a selected option within the program. Although visualizing continental configurations through time is the core of the program, its primary strength is that user-defined data, such as stratigraphic or structural data, can be incorporated and plotted on reconstructed basemaps. This allows the time aspect of all geological data to be united with other user-supplied data within the plate tectonic framework.