Depression (geology) in the context of "Lake"

The Caspian Sea is the world's largest inland body of water, described as the world's largest lake and usually referred to as a full-fledged sea. An endorheic basin, it is situated in both Europe and Asia: east of the Caucasus, west of the broad steppe of Central Asia, south of the fertile plains of Southern Russia in Eastern Europe, and north of the mountainous Iranian Plateau. It covers a surface area of 371,000 km (143,000 sq mi) (excluding the highly saline lagoon of Garabogazköl to its east), an area approximately equal to that of Japan, with a volume of 78,200 km (19,000 cu mi). It has a salinity of approximately 1.2% (12 g/L), about a third of the salinity of average seawater. It is bounded by Kazakhstan to the northeast, Russia to the northwest, Azerbaijan to the southwest, Iran to the south, and Turkmenistan to the southeast. The name of the Caspian Sea is derived from the ancient Iranic Caspi people.

The lake stretches 1,200 km (750 mi) from north to south, with an average width of 320 km (200 mi). Its gross coverage is 386,400 km (149,200 sq mi) and the surface is about 27 m (89 ft) below sea level. Its main freshwater inflow, Europe's longest river, the Volga, enters at the shallow north end. Two deep basins form its central and southern zones. These lead to horizontal differences in temperature, salinity, and ecology. The seabed in the south reaches 1,023 m (3,356 ft) below sea level, which is the third-lowest natural non-oceanic depression on Earth after Baikal and Tanganyika lakes.

The Andes (/ˈændiːz/ AN-deez), Andes Mountains or Andean Mountain Range (Spanish: Cordillera de los Andes; Quechua: Anti) are the longest continental mountain range in the world, forming a continuous highland along the western edge of South America. The range is 8,900 km (5,500 mi) long and 200 to 700 km (120 to 430 mi) wide (widest between 18°S and 20°S latitude) and has an average height of about 4,000 m (13,000 ft). The Andes extend from south to north through seven South American countries: Argentina, Chile, Bolivia, Peru, Ecuador, Colombia, and Venezuela.

Along their length, the Andes are split into several ranges, separated by intermediate depressions. The Andes are the location of several high plateaus—some of which host major cities such as Arequipa, Bogotá, Cali, Medellín, El Alto, La Paz, Mérida, Santiago and Sucre. The Altiplano Plateau is the world's second highest after the Tibetan Plateau. These ranges are in turn grouped into three major divisions based on climate: the Tropical Andes, the Dry Andes, and the Wet Andes.

Skopje Basin (Macedonian: Скопска Котлина, romanized: Skopska Kotlina) or Skopje Plain (Macedonian: Скопско Поле, romanized: Skopsko Pole) is one of the largest basins in North Macedonia. It represents the second largest valley along the course of the Vardar river. The Skopje Valley is formed by the mountains of Žeden, Ivanje (Matka) and Suva Gora in the west, Skopska Crna Gora in the north, Gradiščanska Planina (Gjurište) in the east and northeast, Golešnica in the southeast and Kitka, Karadžica and Vodno, i.e. the massif of Mokra Planina in the south. The administrative and population centre of the Skopje Basin is Skopje, the capital of North Macedonia.

The Great Rift Valley (Swahili: Bonde la ufa) is a series of contiguous geographic depressions, approximately 6,000 or 7,000 kilometres (4,300 mi) in total length, the definition varying between sources, that runs from the southern Turkish Hatay Province in Asia, through the Red Sea, to Mozambique in Southeast Africa. While the name remains in some usages, it is rarely used in geology where the term "Afro-Arabian Rift System" is preferred.

This valley extends southward from Western Asia into the eastern part of Africa, where several deep, elongated lakes, called ribbon lakes, exist on the rift valley floor, Lake Malawi and Lake Tanganyika being two such examples. The region has a unique ecosystem and contains a number of Africa's wildlife parks.

The Kura-Aras Lowland, Kura-Aras Depression or Kura-Aras Basin (Azerbaijani: Kür-Araz ovalığı) is a vast depression in central-southern Azerbaijan defined by the valleys of the Kura River and Aras River. It is situated by the West shore of the Caspian Sea and is part of the Aral-Caspian Depression. It is delimited by the Greater Caucasus from the North, Lesser Caucasus from the West and the Talysh Mountains from the South. The name is derived from the names of the two rivers in the area: the Kura and the Aras.

Lake Victoria is one of the African Great Lakes. With a surface area of approximately 59,947 km (23,146 sq mi), Lake Victoria is Africa's largest lake by area, the world's largest tropical lake, and the world's second-largest fresh water lake by surface area after Lake Superior in North America. In terms of volume, Lake Victoria is the world's ninth-largest continental lake, containing about 2,424 km (1.965×10 acre⋅ft) of water. Lake Victoria occupies a shallow depression in Africa. The lake has an average depth of 40 m (130 ft) and a maximum depth of 80–81 m (262–266 ft). Its catchment area covers 169,858 km (65,583 sq mi). The lake has a shoreline of 7,142 km (4,438 mi) when digitized at the 1:25,000 level, with islands constituting 3.7% of this length.

The lake's area is divided among three countries: Tanzania occupies 49% (33,700 km (13,000 sq mi)), Uganda 45% (31,000 km (12,000 sq mi)), and Kenya 6% (4,100 km (1,600 sq mi)).

A pond is a small, still, land-based body of water formed by pooling inside a depression, either naturally or artificially. A pond is smaller than a lake and there are no official criteria distinguishing the two, although defining a pond to be less than 5 hectares (12 acres) in area, less than 5 metres (16 ft) in depth and with less than 30% of its area covered by emergent vegetation helps in distinguishing the ecology of ponds from those of lakes and wetlands.

Ponds can be created by a wide variety of natural processes (e.g. on floodplains as cutoff river channels, by glacial processes, by peatland formation, in coastal dune systems, by beavers). They can simply be isolated depressions (such as a kettle hole, vernal pool, prairie pothole, or simply natural undulations in undrained land) filled by runoff, groundwater, or precipitation, or all three of these. They can be further divided into four zones: vegetation zone, open water, bottom mud and surface film.