images
esiegel | December 22, 2013"We especially need imagination in science. It is not all mathematics, nor all logic, but it is somewhat beauty and poetry." -Maria Montessori
The Universe has some wonderful sights to show you if you know how to look for them, and that's maybe most apparent when you look at some of the amazing images from the Hubble Space Telescope. Here on Earth, however, the onset of winter for many of us brings a little bit of scarcity with it, something Drive By Truckers can help you relate to with their song,
When The Well Runs Dry.
You might not think these two things are related -- the wonders of…
esiegel | October 8, 2012"When I was having that alphabet soup, I never thought that it would pay off." -Vanna White
Ever want an A-to-Z illustrated alphabet of astrophysics? Turns out that -- other than writing your own via Galaxy Zoo -- it doesn't yet exist. So I thought it would be delightful to make one for you... right now!
Image credit: Flickr user Image Editor / 11304375@N07.
A is for Aurora, polar lights fast and slow,
the Sun's hot electrons make the atmosphere glow.
Image credit: Andrew Hamilton of JILA / Colorado, http://jila.colorado.edu/~ajsh/insidebh/schw.html.
B is for Black hole, a star's…
dolittle | May 29, 2012The 10 winning images from the inaugural Bio-Art competition hosted by the Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology (FASEB) were announced last week. Here are my favorites:
Closely related species of electric fish with recordings of their electric organ discharge. This organ is used for communication and prey location, similar to echolocation used by bats. Note how the pattern differs between species. Submitted by Matthew E. Arnegard (Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, Seattle, WA), Derrick J. Zwickl (University of Kansas, Lawrence) as well as Ying Lu and Harold H.…
sciencepunk | September 14, 2011Over the years, we've been blessed with innumerable breathtaking images from the pursuit of science - from the unimaginably huge Pillars of Creation to the endlessly tiny Mandelbrot Fractals. But some of these images have taken on an iconic status, instantly recognisable to schoolchildren and Republican presidential candidates alike. The problem is, a lot of these iconic science images are more icon than science. Here's a few you might have seen before.
The Rutherford Model
What you think it means: This is an atom.
What's wrong with it: This model is a century out of date.
Back in 1911,…
catdynamics | December 7, 2010From Earth to the Universe was a brilliant outreach project for the 2009 International Year of Astronomy, displaying online, and in real life, some of the best astronomical images around.
Now we have the Year of the Solar System coming up, who knew, and more and better images are needed!
From Earth to the Solar System
FETTSS will be an online collection of images that can be freely downloaded and exhibited by organizations worldwide in whatever manner they choose.
In celebration of NASA's Year of the Solar System, the images will showcase the excitement and discoveries of planetary…
eklemetti | March 24, 2010
The fissure vent eruption near Eyjafjallajokull in Iceland. Image by Ãorsteinn Gunnarsson, March 22, 2010.
It has been hard to keep up with the flood of news from the Eyjafjallajokull eruption in Iceland. Eruptions readers have done a good job with getting new images, videos and info up as they happen, so you might want to peruse the comments for those sorts of tidbits (along with discussion of what might be happening).
Here is the latest:
The eruption at Fimmvörduháls (considering the eruption is actually occurring between the ice caps) could last weeks to months, which isn't too…
eklemetti | February 17, 2010
Sakurajima Volcano in Japan, taken from the ISS on February 17. Image courtesy of Soichi Noguchi.
Eruptions reader Tim Stone sent me a link to the TwitPic feed for Soichi Noguchi, the Japanese astronaut currently on board of the International Space Station. The space traveller got a shot of Sakurajima from space, showing a beautiful plume drifting off - and great detail of the towns and roads near the volcano. Soichi has some other great shots (and comments to go with them), including my old haunt Seattle (with a comment about Ichiro), Mt. Aso - another Japanese volcano, and the Patagonian…
khannula | August 21, 2009I've been trying to get some xeriscaping established this summer, and I've been very pleased with the plants that are growing. This one, Ceratostigma plumbaginoides, is supposed to become a groundcover, and it's spreading quite well. But with the flowers have come some interesting pollinating... things... that I can't identify.
The leaves in the picture are about a centimeter or two across, so that thing is pretty big. It moves like a hummingbird, hovering in place and then zipping to another flower. (In fact, when my kid was buzzed by one recently, he swore it had been a hummingbird.) It'…
khannula | July 6, 2009One of the tricky things to convey about rocks, especially in a lecture or in a textbook, is the way geologists can see such different things at different scales - from thousands of kilometers to a few micrometers - and the way that all those observations fit together to understanding the processes that shape the Earth. Static photos, whether on paper or projected onto a screen or on a computer, don't convey all the information that one can get from a single outcrop - standing back from it, climbing up close to it, crawling over it with a hand lens. (And that's leaving out the perspective of…
grrlscientist | July 6, 2009tags: Antarctica, music, Terra Nova, Sinfonia Antarctica, photography, streaming video
This video is the trailer for DJ Spooky/Paul D. Miller's next large scale multimedia performance work: an acoustic portrait of a rapidly changing continent. Terra Nova: Sinfonia Antarctica is a seventy minute performance featuring music combined with visual material from Getty Images' vast collection, creating a unique and powerful moment around man's relationship with nature [5:36]
Quark Expeditions is searching for an Official Blogger to join a voyage to Antarctica. Their goals are to have this person…
grrlscientist | November 7, 2008tags: Anne Loftus playground, Inwood, Manhattan, NYC, NYC through my eye, photography, Autumn in NYC
Image: GrrlScientist 6 November 2008 [larger view].
As I've already mentioned, I am having a rough time right now, but I love photography, so I decided that I should view NYC through a shutter as a way to deal with my labile mood state. So as I walked down the street, I decided that I would photograph a rather colorful park that was nearby. Even though I've passed by it many times, I've never visited the Anne Loftus playground, so I spontaneously decided to photograph it.
I took this…
grrlscientist | October 31, 2008tags: bird behavior, emotional lives of animals, ornithology, birds, avian, photoessay
The bird calls out after realising that his (her?) mate is dead
Image: Wilson Hsu, AbuNawaf.com [larger view].
There are many inexplicable and tragic events in nature, yet few are captured on film. Here is an interesting series of photographs depicting a pair of swallows, Hirundo rustica (known as the Barn Swallow in the United States). In this series of images, we watch the story that unfolds after one of the birds was fatally injured, yet the bird's mate remains nearby, delivering food or water and…
grrlscientist | July 24, 2008tags: dinosaurs, Tarbosaurus bataar, paleontology, fossils, Tyrannosaurs rex
The newly unveiled fossil skeleton of the juvenile Tarbosaurus bataar in its protective jacket.
Discovered in 2006, a near-perfect complete skeleton of a juvenile Tarbosaurus find was made available for public viewing for the first time today by the Hayashibara Museum of Natural Science in Okayama, western Japan. This fossil was originally unearthed from a chunk of sandstone in the Gobi Desert of Mongolia by a team of Mongolian and Japanese researchers. The fossil of the young dinosaur is roughly 70 million years…
grrlscientist | May 13, 2008tags: foot binding, China, social behavior, fashion psychology, streaming video
A friend sent these images depicting foot-binding in China. To say the least, I knew this practice was painful and caused permanent malformations, but seeing the damage makes my own feet scream in agony. How did such a strange and harmful behavior like this ever become a cultural fashion/fad/fetish?
An elderly Chinese woman who was one of the countless victims of foot-binding. She can barely stand or walk, even with assistance. Gee, I wonder why?
An elderly Chinese woman, one of countless millions of female…
esiegel | April 24, 2008(Thanks to Starts With A Bang! reader benhead.) The Hubble Space Telescope has released some beautiful images of colliding galaxies in a huge collection! Here are some of my favorites, with my very own names for them (real name in parentheses).
We'll start with the Glowing Arrow (Arp 148):
The Highway Windshield (NGC 6240)
The Flaming Splinter (NGC 6670):
And finally, I call this one "my new desktop wallpaper:"
I was going to write a whole bunch about this, but I have been beaten to the punch by Universe Today, Bad Astronomy, and Will Gater. I'll have to wake up earlier next time! In the…
grrlscientist | March 16, 2008tags: WTC, World Trade Center, iron cross, NYC, NYCLife
The iron cross, salvaged from Ground Zero after the World Trade Center
was destroyed by terrorists on 11 September 2001,
is located in Inwood, borough of Manhattan, NYC.
Image: GrrlScientist 2008. [wallpaper size].
WTC Iron cross plaque in Inwood, borough of Manhattan, NYC.
Image: GrrlScientist 2008. [wallpaper size].
grrlscientist | February 25, 2008tags: NYC, glass and sky, Lincoln Center skyscrapers, photography, NYC through my eye
Glass and Sky #3.
(Lincoln Center skyscrapers).
Image: GrrlScientist 2008. [larger view].
Yesterday, it was quite cold and breezy in NYC, but the conditions were superb for photographing the city, especially in the afternoon, when I captured some lovely images of Lincoln Center skyscrapers illuminated by the dying sun. This is my favorite of the three "Glass and Sky" images I am sharing with you here. I especially like it because of the contrasting colors of the buildings and their placement in the image…
grrlscientist | February 25, 2008tags: NYC, glass and sky, Lincoln Center skyscrapers, photography, NYC through my eye
Glass and Sky #2.
(Lincoln Center skyscrapers. This particular building is a residence -- either an apartment or condominium).
Image: GrrlScientist 2008. [larger view].
Yesterday, it was quite cold and breezy in NYC, but the conditions were superb for photographing the city, especially in the afternoon, when I captured some lovely images of skyscrapers illuminated by the dying sun.
grrlscientist | February 25, 2008tags: NYC, glass and sky, Lincoln Center skyscrapers, photography, NYC through my eye
Glass and Sky #1.
(Lincoln Center skyscrapers).
Image: GrrlScientist 2008. [larger view].
Yesterday, it was quite cold and breezy in NYC, but the conditions were superb for photographing the city, especially in the afternoon, when I captured some lovely images of Lincoln Center skyscrapers illuminated by the dying sun.
grrlscientist | February 25, 2008tags: NYC, 72nd street subway station, photography, NYC through my eye
NYC subway stations at 72nd and Broadway (foreground; the 1-2-3 trains stop here).
You can see some snow is still present.
Image: GrrlScientist 2008. [larger view].
I captured this image yesterday in the late afternoon. One thing that I find fascinating about NYC buildings is the close proximity of old and new buildings. For example, the subway stations are old buildings along with another one, on the far right (which is being worked on, as you can see), but the buildings to the left and in the center (background) are…