Farewell, Great White North.
Climate scientists, as quoted in New Scientist, have said goodbye to summer ice in the Arctic. For good: Despite fears of runaway sea-ice loss after […]
Science Art: Jupiter's Family of Comets, 1898
This is a diagram from A New Astronomy For Beginners, a textbook that’s about a century and a quarter old, or a…
Read moreSONG: Your Catalogue
SONG: “Your Catalogue”. (OGG version here.)
ARTIST: grant.
SOURCE: NBC News, “New wild cat species is ide…
Read moreScience Art: Beebe's Bathysphäre, 1934
This is an image of William Beebe’s bathysphere, as placed on Wikimedia Commons by ETH Bibliothek. It was creat…
Read moreScience Art: Power of RCA Electron Microscope, May 1955
These are diatoms, I think, seen by two different microscopes.
As the caption from Popular Electronics says…
Read moreScience Art: Red Pepper, 1910.
Red pepper (Cayenne pepper) will cure almost any case of la grippe within 24 hours, or so they say. At least no…
Read moreScience Art: Figs. 1315-1333 (Various rotary piston engines), 1890.
This is a page of figures from (deep breath) The engineer’s sketch-book of mechanical movements, devices, appli…
Read moreA blood test for autism.
MedicalXpress reports that Swedish and Iranian researchers might have identified a way to diagnose autism physically, by checking biomarkers in blood plasma: In the current […]
Science Art: FAGOCITOSI BY RAFF by Raffmara.
Look, this isn’t funny, OK? This isn’t funny at all. If this wasn’t going on inside your body all the time, you would be SO […]
Language is the music of emotion.
PLoS ONE presents research on music and words, showing that, no matter what language you use, speaking an emotion uses the same sounds as playing […]
Cheer up, science fiction!
It’s probably just coincidence that the week after pulp hero John Carter, Warlord of Mars finally made it to the big screen, Neal Stephenson appeared […]
The simple elegance of the Flame Challenge.
Alan Alda asks exactly the right question in exactly the right way: As a curious 11-year-old, Alan Alda asked his teacher, “What is a flame?” […]
SONG: “Back into flow”
SONG: “Back into flow.” (To download: double right-click & “Save As”) ARTIST: grant. SOURCE: Based on “What it’s like to wear a brain-stimulating ‘thinking cap’”, […]
Science Art: 5257: Life cycle of Diphyllobothrium latum.
Click to embiggen This is Diphyllobothrium latum, a tapeworm that might make itself at home inside you if you eat undercooked fish. The picture comes […]
What’s made from blue cheese and cleans itself?
If Inhabitat.com’s on the money with this one, the answer could soon be “just about anything,” thanks to Swiss scientists who’ve used blue cheese fungus […]
Happy birthday, zeppelin!
Wired celebrates the anniversary of that very special day, March 14, 1899, when Count Ferdinand Von Zeppelin got the U.S. patent for his design for […]
The Guild reviewed.
Check this out: http://www.newscientist.com/blogs/culturelab/2012/03/songs-torn-from-science-headlines.html Forget your Variety and your Rolling Stone. The Guild of Scientific Troubadours just received positive notice from a writer for New […]
Facebook more efficient than IQ tests at determining employability. (Yeah, HR will be reading your updates.)
Forbes takes us one step closer to the Facebook-dominated society with a Northern Illinois University study that finds a quick social media review works better […]
100% efficiency? Bah. Here’s an LED that’s MORE than 100% efficient.
Wired reveals how MIT made this cool magic trick happen – by using a little bit electricity to convert heat into light: The LED produces […]
Science Art: Manière de pêcher la Tortüe; le Lamantin from Histoire des aventuriers flibustiers, Volume I (1744)
This engraving shows a bunch of humans spearing a sea turtle. But wait! A manatee looks on in terror, clutching her child! And thinks back […]
Vulture CSI: How carrion eaters are upending forensics.
Associated Press goes deep inside one of America’s most macabre jobs – studying how efficiently vultures consume dead bodies: Experienced investigators would normally have interpreted […]