The Most Amazing Science Images Of 2014
by nezzit · 6 hours ago
Birth of a Snowflake
One of the more technically creative time-lapses we've seen in a long while, Snowtime is a 2-minute "microscopic time-lapse" by Vyacheslav Ivanov that captures the mesmerizing bloom of budding ice crystals in all their hexagonal glory.
Earth and the Moon, in a Single Frame
China's Chang'e 5 test vehicle captured this rare glimpse of the Moon's far side in October, from just past the halfway point on its lunar-looping test flight.
The First-Ever Footage of a "Black Seadevil"
On November 17th, researchers with the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute acquired footage of Melanocetus (aka "the Black Seadevil"), a species of anglerfish never before filmed alive in its natural, deep-sea habitat.
Stare Into the Heart of the Biggest Sunspot in 24 Years
On October 25th, giant sunspot AR 2192 – the largest sunspot astronomers have observed in nearly a quarter century – erupted in an X3.1-class solar flare, one of the most powerful flares documented this year.
Google Executive Alan Eustace Crushes Felix Baumgartner's Free-Fall Record
Alan Eustace, a senior vice president at Google, fell from the top of the stratosphere on the morning of October 24, plummeting nearly 26 vertical miles in the span of about 15 minutes. In doing so, he broke daredevil Felix Baumgartner's 2012 record for world's highest-altitude free fall by more than 1,000 feet.
The Great Lakes Experience Their Deepest Freeze in 20 Years
In February, for the first time since 1994, 88% of the surface of the Great Lakes froze solid.
Marvel at the Awesome Sight of a Volcanic Blast
Earlier this year, while vacationing in Papua New Guinea with his wife, Phil McNamara captured this captivating footage of Mount Tavurvur ejecting untold heaps of lava, rock, and ash hundreds of meters into the air. Between the striking burst of clouds above the volcano and the jarring boom of the delayed shockwave, it's one of the most dramatic eruption videos we've ever seen.
Photo of Super Typhoon Vongfong
NASA astronaut Reid Wiseman captured this incredible photograph of super typhoon Vongfang on October 9th, from aboard the International Space Station. "I've seen many from here," Wiseman said of Vongfong, which had recently become the largest, most powerful storm of 2014, "but none like this."
Mesmerizing Anatomical X-Ray GIFs
San Francisco based graphic designer Cameron Drake converted some X-ray footage into a series of GIFs for one of his recent projects. The resulting animations are really quite beautiful.
The Deepest into Space Anyone Has Ever Seen
Using a naturally-existing zoom lens in space, the Hubble telescope in January took the deepest look into a cluster of galaxies ever taken in space to grab these pictures of galaxy cluster Abell 2744.
New Images Reveal the Shape of our Galaxy's Magnetic Field
The European Space Agency reports that this image, captured by the Planck spacecraft, is among the first to reveal the shape of the Milky Way's magnetic field. The colors show temperature, with dark red the hottest and dark blue the coldest. And the relief lines reveal the shape of the vast magnetic field that envelops our galaxy and protects us from some of the high energy particles zooming through deep space.
An Historic Image of Planet Formation Around a Young Star
Earlier this year, the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) captured the sharpest picture ever of a protoplanetary disc surrounding a young star. The image, which bears a striking resemblance to prior artistic impressions, is set to revolutionize our understanding of how planets form. The picture is one of ALMA's first observations to be made at its near-final configuration, as this remarkable device is still being calibrated. The new image was taken as part of the testing and verification process for the telescope — so the best images are still to come.
An Ultra HD Time-Lapse of Earth
It's strange, but we can be surprisingly blasé about space-imagery, our appetites glutted by a steady stream of "mesmerizing," "humbling," and "mindblowing" footage of our planet. It takes more than a view from the ISS to give us pause. So trust us when we say that this video is definitely worth the watch.
Real Life Mosquito Tornado is far More Terrifying Than Sharknado
While visiting Leziria Grande at Vila Franca de Xira in Portugal recently, photographer Ana Filipa Scarpa noticed something off in the distance that resembled a funnel cloud. But it wasn't a tornado, or even a funnel for that matter. Rather, it was something... alive.
A Stunning Example of Collective Intelligence
Individual ants are not very smart, but ants working together in a colony are capable of extraordinary feats. Case in point: This remarkable video, in which a colony of ants has transformed into a daisy chain to pull a dead millipede – behavior which, prior to the video's release, had never been seen before.
A Close-Up View of One of the World's Most Venomous Spiders
Entomologist Alex Wild captured these incredible photographs on a recent visit to the venomous chemistry lab (!) of David Wilson, a researcher at James Cook University's Centre for Biodiscovery and Molecular Development of Therapeutics. Read the story behind the shot here.
This ISS Experiment Looks Like a Miniature Star Factory
Flame Extinguishment-2 (FLEX-2) is the second iteration of an experiment designed to test how burning droplets of fuel behave in space. But unlike other fire experiments aboard the ISS, FLEX-2 requires the flaming droplets to be suspended, free of other objects (like, say, a candle wick) to better study the rate at which fuel mixtures evaporate and burn, and the conditions required for soot to form. According to NASA, "understanding these processes could lead to the production of a safer spacecraft as well as increased fuel efficiency for engines using liquid fuel on Earth."
Giant, Worm-Slurping Leech Filmed for the First Time
For the first time, filmmakers in the forests of Borneo's Mount Kinabalu documented the so-repulsive-it's-captivating behavior of a large, red, worm-guzzling predator. While it remains unclassified by science, the animal is known to the area's tribespeople, fittingly, as the "Giant Red Leech."
This is a Praying Mantis Wearing 3D Glasses
Scientists at Newcastle University are outfitting praying mantises with the world's smallest 3D glasses, to better understand how these notoriously dextrous predators perceive depth.
The Curiosity Rover Snaps a Stunning Photo of a Martian Sunset
In April, the Curiosity rover snapped this shot of the sun setting behind Gale Crater's western rim. And as you can see, the sunsets on Mars are quite different from what we see here on Earth.
by nezzit · 6 hours ago
Birth of a Snowflake
One of the more technically creative time-lapses we've seen in a long while, Snowtime is a 2-minute "microscopic time-lapse" by Vyacheslav Ivanov that captures the mesmerizing bloom of budding ice crystals in all their hexagonal glory.
Earth and the Moon, in a Single Frame
China's Chang'e 5 test vehicle captured this rare glimpse of the Moon's far side in October, from just past the halfway point on its lunar-looping test flight.
The First-Ever Footage of a "Black Seadevil"
On November 17th, researchers with the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute acquired footage of Melanocetus (aka "the Black Seadevil"), a species of anglerfish never before filmed alive in its natural, deep-sea habitat.
Stare Into the Heart of the Biggest Sunspot in 24 Years
On October 25th, giant sunspot AR 2192 – the largest sunspot astronomers have observed in nearly a quarter century – erupted in an X3.1-class solar flare, one of the most powerful flares documented this year.
Google Executive Alan Eustace Crushes Felix Baumgartner's Free-Fall Record
Alan Eustace, a senior vice president at Google, fell from the top of the stratosphere on the morning of October 24, plummeting nearly 26 vertical miles in the span of about 15 minutes. In doing so, he broke daredevil Felix Baumgartner's 2012 record for world's highest-altitude free fall by more than 1,000 feet.
The Great Lakes Experience Their Deepest Freeze in 20 Years
In February, for the first time since 1994, 88% of the surface of the Great Lakes froze solid.
Marvel at the Awesome Sight of a Volcanic Blast
Earlier this year, while vacationing in Papua New Guinea with his wife, Phil McNamara captured this captivating footage of Mount Tavurvur ejecting untold heaps of lava, rock, and ash hundreds of meters into the air. Between the striking burst of clouds above the volcano and the jarring boom of the delayed shockwave, it's one of the most dramatic eruption videos we've ever seen.
Photo of Super Typhoon Vongfong
NASA astronaut Reid Wiseman captured this incredible photograph of super typhoon Vongfang on October 9th, from aboard the International Space Station. "I've seen many from here," Wiseman said of Vongfong, which had recently become the largest, most powerful storm of 2014, "but none like this."
Mesmerizing Anatomical X-Ray GIFs
San Francisco based graphic designer Cameron Drake converted some X-ray footage into a series of GIFs for one of his recent projects. The resulting animations are really quite beautiful.
The Deepest into Space Anyone Has Ever Seen
Using a naturally-existing zoom lens in space, the Hubble telescope in January took the deepest look into a cluster of galaxies ever taken in space to grab these pictures of galaxy cluster Abell 2744.
New Images Reveal the Shape of our Galaxy's Magnetic Field
The European Space Agency reports that this image, captured by the Planck spacecraft, is among the first to reveal the shape of the Milky Way's magnetic field. The colors show temperature, with dark red the hottest and dark blue the coldest. And the relief lines reveal the shape of the vast magnetic field that envelops our galaxy and protects us from some of the high energy particles zooming through deep space.
An Historic Image of Planet Formation Around a Young Star
Earlier this year, the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) captured the sharpest picture ever of a protoplanetary disc surrounding a young star. The image, which bears a striking resemblance to prior artistic impressions, is set to revolutionize our understanding of how planets form. The picture is one of ALMA's first observations to be made at its near-final configuration, as this remarkable device is still being calibrated. The new image was taken as part of the testing and verification process for the telescope — so the best images are still to come.
An Ultra HD Time-Lapse of Earth
It's strange, but we can be surprisingly blasé about space-imagery, our appetites glutted by a steady stream of "mesmerizing," "humbling," and "mindblowing" footage of our planet. It takes more than a view from the ISS to give us pause. So trust us when we say that this video is definitely worth the watch.
Real Life Mosquito Tornado is far More Terrifying Than Sharknado
While visiting Leziria Grande at Vila Franca de Xira in Portugal recently, photographer Ana Filipa Scarpa noticed something off in the distance that resembled a funnel cloud. But it wasn't a tornado, or even a funnel for that matter. Rather, it was something... alive.
A Stunning Example of Collective Intelligence
Individual ants are not very smart, but ants working together in a colony are capable of extraordinary feats. Case in point: This remarkable video, in which a colony of ants has transformed into a daisy chain to pull a dead millipede – behavior which, prior to the video's release, had never been seen before.
A Close-Up View of One of the World's Most Venomous Spiders
Entomologist Alex Wild captured these incredible photographs on a recent visit to the venomous chemistry lab (!) of David Wilson, a researcher at James Cook University's Centre for Biodiscovery and Molecular Development of Therapeutics. Read the story behind the shot here.
This ISS Experiment Looks Like a Miniature Star Factory
Flame Extinguishment-2 (FLEX-2) is the second iteration of an experiment designed to test how burning droplets of fuel behave in space. But unlike other fire experiments aboard the ISS, FLEX-2 requires the flaming droplets to be suspended, free of other objects (like, say, a candle wick) to better study the rate at which fuel mixtures evaporate and burn, and the conditions required for soot to form. According to NASA, "understanding these processes could lead to the production of a safer spacecraft as well as increased fuel efficiency for engines using liquid fuel on Earth."
Giant, Worm-Slurping Leech Filmed for the First Time
For the first time, filmmakers in the forests of Borneo's Mount Kinabalu documented the so-repulsive-it's-captivating behavior of a large, red, worm-guzzling predator. While it remains unclassified by science, the animal is known to the area's tribespeople, fittingly, as the "Giant Red Leech."
This is a Praying Mantis Wearing 3D Glasses
Scientists at Newcastle University are outfitting praying mantises with the world's smallest 3D glasses, to better understand how these notoriously dextrous predators perceive depth.
The Curiosity Rover Snaps a Stunning Photo of a Martian Sunset
In April, the Curiosity rover snapped this shot of the sun setting behind Gale Crater's western rim. And as you can see, the sunsets on Mars are quite different from what we see here on Earth.
