Fronteras: Zooming the Universe

Explore borders—political, physical, legal and cosmic—across scales

Zoom Scale: Planetary

Scale: Planetary

Drag to pan • Scroll to zoom • Click hotspots to learn about fronteras at each scale.

What is a frontera?

A frontera (border) can be a legal line, a cultural divide, a physical threshold, or a conceptual limit. This interactive page layers fronteras from streets and national borders up to the edge of the observable universe.

Quick facts

Political borders: Often defined by treaties, sometimes by rivers, mountains or lines on a map. Modern border regimes include land, airspace and cyber realms.

Maritime zones (UNCLOS): Territorial sea (12 nm), Exclusive Economic Zone (200 nm), continental shelf rights — legal fronteras at sea.

Kármán line: ~100 km above sea level — common edge between atmosphere and space.

Heliopause: The bubble where the Sun's solar wind yields to interstellar space — boundary of our heliosphere.

Observable universe: The cosmic particle horizon ~46.5 billion light years — the ultimate practical frontera for observation.

Click a hotspot

Interactive details will appear here when you click a hotspot. Try the colored dots on the visualization.

Speed Controls

Use the slider to jump scales quickly

Level