The adaptive power of the human being helped in conquering the entire Globe.

But even so, to the extreme north or south, the climate is too harsh to sustain human populations. So, a question rises: till which latitude can humans live?

The northernmost permanent human settlement, which is not a scientific or meteorological station, military outpost, is Siorapaluk (photo above), an Inuit (Eskimo) village in northwestern Greenland, situated at 77degree47'N, 70degree46'W.

The number of inhabitants is 87. They settled here during the XIXth century, coming from the Arctic islands of Canada. Except during summer, the settlement is always covered in snow. The main occupation of the villagers, almost all year round, is hunting marine mammals, especially seal and walrus.

The cliffs around Siorapaluk are bird breeding grounds for millions of little auks and the thick billed guillemots and in the tundra around the village many polar foxes and arctic hares are to be found.

Siorapaluk has an electrical power plant, direct satellite radio and TV-broadcasting, and common phones.

A few years ago, a new store was built and it is usually very well supplied all year round.

School is combined with church and a small public library, and annually, the settlement is visited by a doctor and a dentist.

Alert, a settlement of 5 inhabitants in Ellesmere Island (Northeastern Canada), 82degree28'N is seen by many as the actual northernmost human settlement, but this is more of a military and meteorological station, like the settlements established in Svalbard during the XXth century, which are mining or research communities.

The northernmost city could be considered Tromsø, Northern Norway, at 69degree34'N and 61,987 inhabitants.

If we are looking for the southernmost human settlement, of course we should discard the research stations from Antarctica.

Because between 55degrees and Antarctica there is almost no land, this is where the southernmost locality is situated. We're talking about the small Chillean village Puerto Toro (photo below), on the eastern coast of Isla Navarino, at the south from Tierra del Fuego (Spanish: "Fire land"), situated at 55degree05'S, 67degree06'W.

The village is inhabited by about 50 fishermen and their families.

Over a hundred years ago, Puerto Toro was one of the most important towns in the region of the Beagle Channel "gold fever" haunted Tierra del Fuego. The importance of Purto Toro vanished with the gold fever.

Not very far away, in the Argentinean part, is the southernmost city in the world, Ushuaia, 54degree48'S, 68degree18'W, with 64,000 inhabitants.