I can barely remember yesterday.

Very neat. Via kottke:

This is mesmerizing: using Google Image Search and starting with a transparent image, this video cycles through each subsequent related image, over 2900 in all.

It gets more interesting the longer it goes on. It’s like watching a visualisation of the neural connections of a cyborg. Or something.

The yeti crab is self-sufficient beyond belief when it comes to it’s dietary requirements.

The bristles that cover the crab’s claws and body are coated in gardens of symbiotic bacteria, which derive energy from the inorganic gases of the seeps. The crab eats the bacteria, using comb-like mouthparts to harvest them from its bristles (see a video of this on our YouTube Channel).

The bacteria in K. puravida gardens are closely related to species that live in other cold seeps and hot hydrothermal vents all over the world. “It looks like the bacteria may use the seeps as stepping stones, to create this global connected population that consumes the energy coming out of seeps and vents,” says Thurber.

Thurber thinks that K. puravida waves its claws to actively farm its bacterial gardens: movements stir up the water around the bacteria, ensuring that fresh supplies of oxygen and sulphide wash over them and helping them to grow. “This ‘dance’ is extraordinary and comical,” says Van Dover. “We’ve never seen this strategy before.”

More at Nature

The BBC has caught a spectacular undersea phenomenon on film. Watch the video on the BBC website.

The science behind the phenomenon:

Dr Mark Brandon Polar oceanographer, The Open University

Freezing sea water doesn’t make ice like the stuff you grow in your freezer. Instead of a solid dense lump, it is more like a seawater-soaked sponge with a tiny network of brine channels within it.

In winter, the air temperature above the sea ice can be below -20C, whereas the sea water is only about -1.9C. Heat flows from the warmer sea up to the very cold air, forming new ice from the bottom. The salt in this newly formed ice is concentrated and pushed into the brine channels. And because it is very cold and salty, it is denser than the water beneath.

The result is the brine sinks in a descending plume. But as this extremely cold brine leaves the sea ice, it freezes the relatively fresh seawater it comes in contact with. This forms a fragile tube of ice around the descending plume, which grows into what has been called a brinicle.

Brinicles are found in both the Arctic and the Antarctic, but it has to be relatively calm for them to grow as long as the ones the Frozen Planet team observed.

BBC Nature

From a talk by Alan Watts. Shame about the strings added in the background.

An interview with John Maus.

The International Space Station has a nice camera on board these days… View fullscreen.

Another (see previous post) impressive time-lapse video found via kottke.

A camera installed on the roof of the Exploratorium museum in San Francisco captured an image of the sky every 10 seconds. From these images, I created a mosaic of time-lapse movies, each showing a single day. The days are arranged in chronological order. My intent was to reveal the patterns of light and weather over the course of a year.

A simple experiment that is almost profound to watch unfold. My favourite part is the way the sunrises and sunsets flood in and out.

Ken Murphy’s “A History of The Sky” (via kottke).

via 3dq

An hour long documentary. via kottke

I’m trying to improve my knowledge of electronics but most books tell you either too much or too little and leave you frustrated. This video filled in the missing gaps for me, regarding transistors.

The most beautiful thing about it is how elegant these electronic components are. They each contain very few materials and mechanisms, but demonstrate a tremendous understanding of the physical world.