bioephemera | October 27, 2009
Heartbreaking photos of albatross chicks, by photographer Chris Jordan:
These photographs of albatross chicks were made just a few weeks ago on Midway Atoll, a tiny stretch of sand and coral near the middle of the North Pacific. The nesting babies are fed bellies-full of plastic by their parents, who soar out over the vast polluted ocean collecting what looks to them like food to bring back to their young. On this diet of human trash, every year tens of thousands of albatross chicks die on Midway from starvation, toxicity, and choking.To document this phenomenon as faithfully as possible,…
bioephemera | October 26, 2009From an essay by AS Byatt:
As I grow older, the fact of the existence of the world's huge compendium of changing and unchangeable tales seems to me more, not less, mysterious. How can they so steadily resemble each other, wherever they come from? How can they be so abstract and so concrete?
bioephemera | October 25, 2009OK: I'm female AND a biologist, and looking at this one freaks ME out!
I'm all in favor of appreciating the beauty of female anatomy and miracle of childbirth and all, but this pasty, long-limbed newborn doll with a detatchable umbilical is nothing compared with its laboring parent, who, in this photo from its etsy creator CozyColeman, looks a lot like Grendel's mom. It's as NSFW as crochet gets, I guess, so it's below the fold.
Yikes! Maybe I'm being uncharitable, but I think if you want to make the thought of pregnancy and childbirth horrifying yet eerily fascinating to your pre-teen…
bioephemera | October 25, 2009
"Mechanical heart"
Bill McConkey
Collage of a digitally enhanced pencil drawing of the human heart and photographs of different brass instruments. Digital artwork. From the Wellcome Image Awards 2009 - see the other winners here.
Last week was Open Access Week, which meant I got to hear a great talk from John Wilbanks of the Science Commons (you should subscribe to their blog!) I've been thinking a lot this week about the legal challenges of data sharing, which is giving me a headache. But there's an easier way to celebrate Open Access Week: by visiting the Guardian's a multimedia show about…
bioephemera | October 23, 2009Has your week been like this, too? I'm just checking. . .
"Fish in a squirrel suit" by Slightly Curious.
Via Regretsy.
bioephemera | October 21, 2009
According to reader Milde, L.A. Burdick's is a "serious chocolate experience." Little did I know she was right - this place even has coffin-shaped chocolate boxes for Halloween. And little chocolate ghosts. Adorable!
Of course, if you really want to impress a Goth girl, there's always Valerie Confections' Mori Ex Cacao gift set. . . or a 1-lb chocolate heart at Pushing Daisies. But personally, I'm going to get me some cute little ghosts.
bioephemera | October 20, 2009
To follow up on my post on Kevin Van Aelst, here's an anatomically-inspired artwork by Heather L. Johnson, whose new show, "Air and Blood", opens this month in NYC:
Using the Holland Tunnel as a point of departure, the artist investigates the way in which anatomical processes are mimicked in the transfer of people, objects and ideas in the urban environment.
I think that's a motorbike in that circulatory diagram - which of course invites comparison with the work of Josh Hadar.
For more on Johnson's new show, check out readymade blog.
bioephemera | October 18, 2009
Via Inventorspot: Hello Kitty goes anatomical, and we discover she even has bows on her guts. Yikes!
But seriously - the second, faux-ivory Hello Kitty looks a little familiar. According to Inventorspot,
you can choose from regular style or an interesting antiqued version with a finish resembling aged ivory. This style is meant to look like a netsuke; a polished and sculpted toggle worn by Japanese citizens and samurai on their kimono sashes from the 17th century on - robes have no pockets, y'see.
A netsuke? Sure. But to me, ivory + anatomy = anatomical teaching models like these. (see also…
bioephemera | October 18, 2009
From the NIDA media guide
Jared Diamond and the New Yorker's parent company have denied all charges in the "Vengeance is Ours" scandal:"
The defendants' attorneys listed 34 reasons, called "affirmative defenses," why they should prevail in the lawsuit. Among them are the contentions that the plaintiffs were not defamed and had not suffered any harm or actual injury to their reputations; that Diamond and The New Yorker had not acted with "actual malice" or with knowledge that The New Yorker story was false; that the article was "substantially true" and thus protected under the First and 14th…
bioephemera | October 17, 2009
From Inhabitat: Artist Brandon Jon Blommaert's recycled trash robots (yes, they're real sculptures) lay waste to Photoshopped landscapes. Check out his flickr page for more - and a "making of" series of photos showing how he built these steampunky robot overlords, who are destined for a Canadian recycling center. Their message is clear: RECYCLE, HUMANITY, OR BE EXTERMINATED!
Thanks to reader Todd F. for the heads-up!
bioephemera | October 17, 2009
NPS Photo/Dan Stahler
This fall, Montana opened a sport hunting season - on wolves. Yeah - the same wolves that wildlife biologists have been working so hard (and spending lots of federal money) to successfully reintroduce to restore the Yellowstone ecosystem. So what happened? It really isn't that surprising: hunters have already killed nine wolves in the wilderness area near Yellowstone's northern border - including both the radio-collared alpha and beta females of Yellowstone Park's Cottonwood wolf pack. Uh. . . oops.
And what do Montana authorities have to say about this?
"Members of…
bioephemera | October 15, 2009For all my microbiology/cell biology peeps, this could be a neat opportunity. ASCB has obtained a two-year stimulus grant from NIH to assemble an image library of the cell. According to Caroline Kane, project PI and professor emerita at UC-Berkeley (and a wonderful person/mentor),
"By visualizing the structure and dynamic behavior of a broad range of cells, scientists and clinicians will be better able to understand the nature of specific cells and cellular processes normal and abnormal. This will likely lead to new discoveries about diseases and drug targets in the future," Kane added. "I'm…
bioephemera | October 15, 2009So it's finally happened: the government is taking blogs so seriously that the FTC is cracking down on us! As you may have heard,
Bloggers who offer endorsements must disclose any payments they have received from the subjects of their reviews or face penalties of up to $11,000 per violation, the Federal Trade Commission said Monday.The agency, charged with protecting consumer interests, had not updated its policy on endorsements in nearly three decades, well before the Internet became a force in shaping consumer tastes. The new rules attempt to make more transparent corporate payments to…
bioephemera | October 14, 2009Just saw this posting:
The Stetten Fellowship seeks to encourage postdoctoral historical research and publication about biomedical sciences and technology and medicine that has been funded by NIH since 1945. Fellowships carry a stipend in the range of $45,000 per year and include health insurance and a work space, computer, and phone in the Office of NIH History. (Fellowships may be renewable to a maximum of 24 months, subject to satisfactory progress.) Stetten Fellows have access to the resources of the Office of NIH History, the collections of the Stetten Museum, the National Library of…
bioephemera | October 14, 2009
Kantor Set
Kevin Van Aelst
Several readers have suggested I blog about photographer Kevin Van Aelst in the past weeks. If you've missed out on his work, Kevin is the sort of artist who can portray cellular mitosis in the legendarily difficult medium of Krispy Kreme, or chromosomes in gummi worm, fingerprints in non-dairy creamer, or the Kantor Set in egg yolk. His work is clever, funny, and meticulous to a fault.
Circulatory System (Heart On Your Sleeve), 2009
Kevin Van Aelst
Here's what the artist has to say:
While the depictions of information--such as an EKG, fingerprint, map or…
bioephemera | October 13, 2009As you'll have noticed by now, I'm not doing a BioE DonorsChoose challenge this year. It was a really tough decision, but I currently have neither the time nor the spare cash to do a DonorsChoose promotion proper justice. Fortunately, I have a baker's dozen Sciblings who are going all out this year to beat the crews at Discover and Nature!
Currently, PalMD is somehow ahead of Chad, but I'm sure that's only because there hasn't been any monkey-dancing yet. Plus, I hear Isis is threatening to deploy a secret weapon, so stay tuned. There's fun, schwag, and warm fuzzies to be had by all, so if…
bioephemera | October 13, 2009
I don't know who commissions a steampunk wedding cake, but whoever they are, I like the way they think. Check out these whimsical steampunk cakes (including a metallic, Jules Verne-esque cephalopod) at the normally frightening Cake Wrecks. And big thanks to LindaCO for the heads up!
bioephemera | October 11, 2009
Dominik Paquet
Getting on this a little late, but the 35th annual Nikon Small World competition winners are out! See article and gallery from SciAm.
bioephemera | October 9, 2009One of the arguments I generally make about Web 2.0 is that, if you are an organization who happens to screw up, you should apologize and move on. Don't try to cover your tracks or shut your critics up - you'll just invite mockery and even more attention than you did before.
Unfortunately, Ralph Lauren apparently doesn't agree with that strategy. They've demanded that Photoshop Disasters and Boing Boing take down images of a Ralph Lauren ad that was so badly photoshopped, many thought it was satire.
The ad depicted a model who was so grotesquely emaciated and doll-like (her head was bigger…
bioephemera | October 9, 2009An awesome post from Shapely Prose - written for all the good single guys out there.
When you approach me in public, you are Schrödinger's Rapist. You may or may not be a man who would commit rape. I won't know for sure unless you start sexually assaulting me. I can't see inside your head, and I don't know your intentions. If you expect me to trust you--to accept you at face value as a nice sort of guy--you are not only failing to respect my reasonable caution, you are being cavalier about my personal safety.Fortunately, you're a good guy. We've already established that. Now that you're…