Colours of the brainbow

by Jean Livet, Harvard University

Brainbow-ing involves neurons of the brain being mapped with flourescent proteins, allowing them to glow with specific colours under a light source. By controlling the proteins involved it is possible to give each neuron a different colour.

In 2000 Jeff Lichtman and Joshua Sanes began playing around with the neurons of mice, and after crossing different genetic lines, created mice with three different shades of cells, blue, green and yellow. By 2007 the Brainbow technique was developed.

Tamily Weissman, "Brainbow” transgenic mouse hippocampus (40X)

The Havard Gazette describes the process in full detail if you're interested.

Spiral nebula

Messier 101
Hubble Legacy Archive, ESA, NASA; Processing and additional imaging - Robert Gendler

There's no denying it - galaxies are beautiful. M101, also know as the Pinwheel Galaxy, is a particularly sexy set of spiral arms and is 170,000 light-years across (twice the size of our own humble milky way).

The red marbling comes from hydrogen gas and occurs in areas where new stars are formed. The white and blue lights are stars and dust and, behind them, background light and galaxies.

M101 is in the constellation Ursa Major, know to me as a child as the Big Dipper or the Plough which can be seen through most of the year in the northern hemisphere.

Mostly though, it's pretty.

The person you love is 72.8% water

Teagan White, based on a quote from 'The Art of Looking Sideways' by Alan Fletcher 

Rat seminipherous tubule

This photo, taken by Alan C. Opsahl of Connecticut is a 40x magnified picture of a rat seminiferous tubule. Who knew rats harboured such beauty?!

So then the whale said to the octopus...

I'm going away to Brighton for a few days and won't get a chance to post so thought I'd just leave you with a little treat to keep you going

(click it to enlarge)

Whaleocalypse

Evolution vs. Creationism

Okay, so the title is more of a hook than a descriptor. This post will be about evolution, and creationism, but mostly about the much loved Mr Charles Darwin and artworks inspired by his theories and life's work. I'd like to open with my song-of-the-moment 'Charlie Darwin' by the Low Anthem whose beautiful melodies can soundtrack this post.



If you like the song I suggest you don't read on to find a deeper meaning in it, it's prettier if you don't. However, for those interested, Prystowsky, a band member, said of the song:

'What does love mean if survival of the fittest is actually the way that everything came to be?[...] It’s such a cutting theory to think that maybe our feelings of love and connection to our fellow man are somehow in our own interest, that they’re selfish . . . . That has a significant impact on the art that you make and the way you live your life.'

Moving on. The publication of Darwin's On the Origin of Species alongside new discoveries in geology and paleontology forced victorians to realise that the world was far older than the bible ever suggested. This nurtured a fascination with pre-human worlds in a time when most believed in The Creation; and gave birth to an new artistic vision that attempted to deal with the religious consequences of the geological discoveries.

Robert Farrena, An Earlier Dorseta (circa. 1850)

'Evolution' at Burning Man, Nevada

Darwin has inspired such varied artworks as sculptures, like the depiction of the evolution of homosapiens (right), to stencil art (below).

'EVOL-ution', stencil art by KrieBeL

What prompted me to write this post was an oil on canvas called 'Darwin took steps' by Glendon Mellow. I saw it first at the Science Online conference 2010 and something about it really resonated with me. I particularly like his incorporation of Darwin's famous Tree of Life sketch (left) but mostly I just think he's a talented artist and love this piece.

'Darwin took steps', Glendon Mellow

Another artwork in a similar vein is that of Kilrizzy who edited this image together:

'Darwin, "I Think..."',Kilrizzy

I'd like to leave you with a piece of art that a young friend of mine drew for me that is a conglomeration of the ideas expressed in the other artworks I've featured. She expresses her angst at the geological propaganda steering her from her faith yet proclaims her belief in the path she's chosen. I pray you take this in the vein it is in intended.

Rebecca Louise Anne Frost, 11

If Alby says it, it must be true

'After a certain high level of technical skill is achieved, science and art tend to coalesce in esthetics, plasticity, and form. The greatest scientists are artists as well'
- Albert Einstein


I came across this quote during some lazy google-ing on the Theory of Relativity and thought I'd share it with you.

Indeed, and as any avid readers (hi Mum) will know, I have long held the notion that the creativity and innovation required of scientists to reach new levels of understanding is that very same required of artists to dominate in their field. This snippet articulates what it is I have so inarticulately and unintelligibly tried to portray through a year's worth of posts on Michelangelo, the Vitruvian man, microwaving CDs, Gunther Von Hagens' Bodyworlds, string theory, Facebook, the brain, tattoos, spirographs and numerous other half-formed meanderings. Einstein's observation takes all the fragments of science, art and sci-art I have come across on the web, wraps them in a parcel, puts a tidy ribbon around them and leaves a note that says: 'friends?'