‘Dueling Banjos’ on Tesla Coils
Two Tesla coils perform a rousing rendition of “Dueling Banjos” in this 2010 video by YouTube user FONentertainment.
Fantastic Brine Icicle form at the Bottom of the Sea
BBC team has captured a time-lapse film of the birth of a brinicle . The temperature of this sinking brine, which was well below 0C, caused the water to freeze in an icy sheath around it.
Where “Brinicle” met the sea bed, a web of ice formed that froze everything it touched, including sea urchins and starfish. 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. Read More…
“PreVue,” Fetal Visualization Device Concept by Melody Shiue
Melody Shiue, an industrial designer of the University of New South Wales has designed a product called, PreVue. It is an e-textile based device that employs latest stretchable display technology over the abdominal region, letting other family members to connect with the fetus in its context. Read More…
Lunar Cubit, Solar Power Generating Pyramids for Abu Dhabi
The energy-generating public art installation Lunar Cubit has won the First Prize at the 2010 Land Art Generator Design Competition. Lunar Cubit is a site specific proposal to be constructed in Abu Dhabi just outside Masdar City, the world’s first zero carbon metropolis once completed. Combining artistic vision with sustainable design and engineering, Lunar Cubit examines the nature of time through nightly contemplation of lunar phases and daily transformation of sunlight into electricity, powering up to 250 homes. Inspired by astronomy, quantum physics and the photoelectric effect, for which Einstein received the Nobel Prize in 1921, this work is open to the public, inviting a personal experience where one can literally reach out and touch a 1.74MW utility scale power plant, in the form of nine monolithic pyramids rising from the sands of Abu Dhabi.
Read More…
Vision and Illusion
The structure of your individual brain has a lot to do with how you perceive optical illusions. Researchers at University College London asked subjects how they perceived illusions of size such as the one used in this video, and then measured the size of each subject’s visual cortex -the amount of brain matter devoted to processing vision
The primary visual cortex has a far more active role in shaping how we see the world than anyone had suspected. Researchers at University College London discovered this when they were testing a pair of optical illusions on some test subjects. Here’s the first one, known as the Ebbinghaus illusion:
Read more at io9.
350 Earth, Global Climate Art Project by 350.org
As part of the launch for 350 EARTH, the first global art show for the climate is signed by 350.org, founder Bill McKibben; multimedia hip-hop innovator DJ Spooky; renowned urban artist Jorge Rodriguez-Gerada; and director of the Santa Fe Art Institute, Diane Karp.
350 EARTH has issued a call to artists to submit climate change design sketches that will be used to create images viewable from space. The designs will be replicated by human beings, assembled like pixels on a computer screen, to create images so large that they will be seen and photographed by an orbiting satellite. The installations take place in over a dozen cities, including in Europe, South America, and seven locations in North America. Each project is large enough to be visible by space, and will be photographed via satellite. The public can sign up to participate in their city, or make their own art.
Most of the art is developed along the line of “gather-enough-people to-form-a-shape (or message)”: for example, a giant “350″ (representing the optimum levels of parts-per-million of CO2 in the atmosphere); a green footprint; or a polar bear created out of hundreds of red tents. 350.org says aerial images will be made available and displayed at the latest climate talks in Cancun starting on Nov. 29.
Read More…
Trees with Glowing Nanoparticles Could Replace Streetlights
Taiwanese researchers have come up with the elegant idea of replacing streetlights with trees, by implanting their leaves with gold nanoparticles. Dr Yen-Hsun Su from Taiwan’s National Cheng Kung University discovered that when you add gold nanoparticles to the leaves of Bacopa caroliniana, it induces a red emission in the chlorophyll. Bacopa caroliniana is a plant widely found in the Southern US, but the same reaction might be possible in other plants and trees. Dr Ye-Hsun points out that this is potentially a win-win-win situation, with the glowing plants reducing power usage, and lowering light pollution, while absorbing CO2.
This ingenious triple threat of an idea could simultaneously reduce carbon emissions, cut electricity costs and reduce light pollution, without sacrificing the safety that streetlights bring.
African Elephants Ambushed by a Nile Crocodile
A baby elephant was taking a drink when a crocodile, hidden under the surface of the water, clamped down on the juvenile’s trunk! Hearing the baby’s calls of distress, the herd of elephants immediately went to its rescue, scaring off the crocodile by trumpeting and stamping the ground. After the attack the herd stayed with the youngster.
When the baby had recovered the herd crossed the waterhole together in safety, only yards from where the crocodile had been hiding. Read More…
Falling from Space Back to Earth
NASA attached a camera to one of its rocket boosters on the space shuttle and recorded the events that take place when a booster is detached from the shuttle. The video takes a while to get going, so if you want to experience the fall from space more quickly, just skip ahead to 1:50.
Via [doobybrain]
New Species Found In Foja Mountains
Foja Mountains are located on the Indonesian island of New Guinea. A recent expedition from Geographic have discovered a bunch of new species, coming with stunning images.
Read More…
Biological Lego Blocks
Researchers at MIT Harvard Division of Health Sciences and Technology harnessed Biological Lego Blocks to build new organs. They achieve this by binding cells together into tiny block-like structures, which can recreate human tissues. And on top, the technique doesn’t need expensive machinery.
Read More…
Magnet-Like Slopes by Koukichi Sugihara
Koukichi Sugihara, from the Meiji Institute for Advanced Study of Mathematical Science in Japan, designed this cardboard sculpture which won the 2010 Illusion Competition.
via [Neatorama]
The Snow Monkeys of Japan
I know it has nothing to do with architecture or fashion, but may be could we put that monkey in the design category. They are too beautiful and well drawn.
This monkeys have incredible abilities and the strangest habits; food seasoning and hot tub bathing are but a few.
Read More…
NASA Delivers Stunning Pictures
Its one of the most deadly place of the solar system, shot like never before by the new Solar Dynamic Observatory of NASA. These first pictures should keep us humble towards the force of the Universe.
NASA’SDO was launched in February for a 5 years mission to study the Sun’s magnetic fields.
Read More…
Sourisverte Eco Rat Trap by Elodie Delassus
Sourisverte is a design changing the idea of the rat trap experience, and leaving behind harmful chemicals. As the rat dies, it participate to the natural cycle of the life.
Read More…
Eye Flowerpot, by Olga Kalugina
Russian based industrial designer created an awesome new object: the Eye pot, allowing to see the roots of your plant and to optimize the conditions of growing. The flowerpot allows to see the root system of the plant. More importantly, the system Eye defines automatically light level, ambient temperature, humidity and conditions of the soil. After what it shows them on the display. All developments of a plant and the influence of various factors can now be estimated.
Read More…
Insect Artwork: Debug by Edhv
Dutch designers of the Edhv team show a series of pictures achieved by tracking the path of tiny insects.
An experimental technology tracking software allows the mapping of the movement patterns of different species of insect. A new medium of artwork coming from life.
Read More…
Element House by MOS
The Element House designed by MOS is an architecture concept for a new ecology. Entirely off the grid, it redefines the domestic space by using living organisms patterns algorithms, creates wells of light by removing the heart of the construction and designs an unconventional pre-fab strategy.
Read More…
