The Tropics

The tropics are a region of the Earth surrounding the Equator. They are delimited in latitude by the Tropic of Cancer in the Northern Hemisphere at 23°26′13.1″ (or 23.43697°) N and the Tropic of Capricorn in the Southern Hemisphere at 23°26′13.1″ (or 23.43697°) S; these latitudes correspond to the axial tilt of the Earth. The tropics are also referred to as the tropical zone and the torrid zone (see geographical zone). The tropics include all the areas on the Earth where the Sun contacts the zenith, a point directly overhead, at least once during the solar year (which is a subsolar point).

The tropics are distinguished from the other climatic and biomatic regions of Earth, which are the middle latitudes and the polar regions on either side of the equatorial zone.

The Tropics comprise 40% of the Earth's surface area and contain 36% of the Earth's landmass.As of 2014^[update], the region is home to 40% of the world population, and this figure is projected to reach 50% by the late 2030s.

"Tropical" is sometimes used in a general sense for a tropical climate to mean warm to hot and moist year-round, often with the sense of lush vegetation.

Many tropical areas have a dry and wet season. The wet season, rainy season or green season is the time of year, ranging from one or more months, when most of the average annual rainfall in a region falls. Areas with wet seasons are disseminated across portions of the tropics and subtropics. Under the Köppen climate classification, for tropical climates, a wet-season month is defined as a month where average precipitation is 60 millimetres (2.4 in) or more.Tropical rainforests technically do not have dry or wet seasons, since their rainfall is equally distributed through the year. Some areas with pronounced rainy seasons see a break in rainfall during mid-season when the intertropical convergence zone or monsoon trough moves poleward of their location during the middle of the warm season; typical vegetation in these areas ranges from moist seasonal tropical forests to savannahs.

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