To scientists, the beauty in Science can be found in the tiniest particularity of their research. From an eppendof with the answer to a difficult question, to a behaviour never seen before. However, it takes something different to make non-scientists excited about science. If fact, there is something that makes science breathtaking to all kinds […]
To scientists, the beauty in Science can be found in the tiniest particularity of their research. From an eppendof with the answer to a difficult question, to a behaviour never seen before. However, it takes something different to make non-scientists excited about science. If fact, there is something that makes science breathtaking to all kinds of people.
Remember the saying “a picture says more than a thousand words”? Well, at Mind the Graph we understand the importance of visual information and we agree with that saying. Thus, we decided to remember the post by Nature in December 2015 and the post by BBC in March 2016.
Here are some science breathtaking pictures elected by Nature and BBC:
Nature | SUPERSONIC BOOM | The shock waves generated by a US jet moving at supersonic speed were imaged from another plane above the Mojave Desert. NASA researchers exploited a technique called schlieren photography, first developed in the nineteenth century by German physicist August Toepler, to capture changes in light as the jet passed through air of different densities.
Nature | THE WEEVIL’S HEAD | This detailed picture of the head of a boll weevil (Anthonomus grandis) was one of the winners in this year’s Wellcome Image Awards. The head, which measures just millimetres across, was imaged using a scanning electron microscope.
Nature | SPACE BUBBLE | This ghostly vision is a planetary nebula — the gently glowing remnants of a dying star. Nicknamed the Southern Owl Nebula, it was captured by the Very Large Telescope in Chile.
Nature | STRIKE ONE | To some people, thunderbolts and lightning are very, very frightening. But to a team at the International Center for Lightning Research and Testing in Florida, they are study subjects that can be triggered by firing rockets into storms. This long-exposure image captures the aftermath of one such researcher-elicited lightning event.
Nature | HEY PLUTO! | The sheer number of images and wealth of data sent back from NASA’s New Horizons probe as it flew past Pluto this year were overwhelming at times. But the Nature team was won over by the beauty of this picture, sent back minutes after the probe’s closest approach to Pluto, when it revealed a cold, odd world, silhouetted by the Sun.
Nature | SPOOKY SLICE | These eerie, skull-shaped objects are actually a vital part of the papyrus plant (Cyperus papyrus). Photographed by David Maitland at 200 times life size, the image is a slice through the ‘vascular bundles’ that plants use to transport fluids through their tissues.
Nature | SILK SHEETS | Barbara Izdebska (Managing picture researcher): “I wish this photo of the vast expanse of silk created by spiders on a meadow in Balatonfökajár in Hungary had made it into print, as I feel that it’s stunning and unique — but it wasn’t to be. Credit goes to local photographer László Novák for taking it, and to the judges of this year’s Wildlife Photographer of the Year for giving Novák a spot as a finalist in that competition.”
BBC | BLACK HENNA ALLERGY | Dye from the henna plant is commonly used to temporarily stain skin or hair orange-brown, but chemical dyes can be added to turn the colour black.
BBC | BONE DEVELOPMENT | Each circle shows bone from an infant at a different age. The youngest (three months before birth) is on the left and the oldest (2.5 years old) is on the right. These historical bones all come from the skeletons of children who died in the 19th Century.
BBC | INSIDE THE HUMAN EYE | Pictures like this are used by doctors to help spot early signs of eye disease. These tiny tunnels are about 100 micrometres (0.1mm) tall.
BBC | BLOOD VESSELS IN THE EYE | The image was created by photographing the blood vessels in the retina – seen here as white spidery lines – as fluorescent dye was passed through.
