How (many pixels) far is it to Mars?

If the Earth were 100 pixels wide, the Moon would be 3000 pixels away. Mars, at its closest, would be 428,000 pixels away. At the current state of space technology, it will take around 150 days to get to Mars.

Distance to Mars website, created by David Paliwoda & Jesse Williams, calculates the earth’s distance to Mars in a super cool way, in pixels.

Better to watch it on Chrome.

See also:

• Minimal Science
• Science songs
• The arrow of time

DNA animated

DNA explained in a visually appealing way.

Created by Territory Studio and creative director David Sheldon-Hicks & art director William Samuel for BBC Knowledge & Learning Explainer series.

See also:

• (notes on) biology
• The DNA of a city
• How big is our universe?

Minimal science

When minimalism expresses the essence of meaning, design comes to honor the pioneering work of some of the world’s most famous scientists. From Darwin’s theory of evolution to Pythagoras’ theorem and Archimedes’ principle, Mumbai-based graphic designer Kapil Bhagat creates clever typographic posters of scientists’ names based on each genius’s breakthrough discovery.

See more after the jump

I am just a noun

Who remembers Joseph Guillotin, Henry Shrapnel and Etienne de Silhouette? Robert Krulwich and Adam Cole in this NPR’s witty video describe the lives of people who became known mostly as nouns.

See also:

• The journey of the English language in time
• Science songs
• Can you take a hint?

Follow @itsasmallweb

Six degrees of artistic influences

We have seen her work before, illustrating the food habits of famous writers and poets.   Now Wendy MacNaughton illustrates in a visually engaging manner the Circles of Influence, created by Michelle Legro and Maria Popova, which reveal the creative encounters and intersections of different writers, scientists, genres and eras.

See also:

• Food for inspiration
• I shall not live in vain
• Social networks from the Enlightement

Darwin, the rock star

Rene Descartes, a pop idol and Charles Darwin, the rock star. That’s how graphic designer Simon Bent decided to re-popularise some of the greatest scientists in history. In his series of illustrations Science vs. Delirium, he renders these iconic figures in the kinds of psychedelic patterns and colors, just like in 1960s acid-rock posters.

See more after the jump

Science songs

People have done some unexpected things in order to popularize science. But, most probably, this tops the list.

Symphony of science is an ongoing project that creates musical pieces out of scientist’s interviews, lectures or documentaries on various topics, mainly from the hard sciences and philosophy. As F, who sent the link, said: the epitomy of geekiness.

Well, I admit, this is one imaginative use of the (usually abused) AutoTune.

See also:

• How big is our universe?
• Science distilled in a phrase
• Antikythera mechanism explained by LEGO

Building the future: 150 years of innovative thinking

It has always been on the cutting edge of science and technology, producing new innovative ideas in almost every field of life and science. We are talking about the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), which celebrates this month 150 years of innovative thinking and maverick genius, according to the Guardian.

Photograph: Andreas Feininger/Time & Life Pictures, The Guardian

Its interdisciplinary character and explosive innovations, whether these include Roberto Bolle’s avatar or the sparkling new David Koch Institute for Integrative Cancer Research, where scientists, engineers and clinicians gather together under the same roof, its Initiative on Energy , or even today’s publication on which technologies are likeliest to advance more quickly, has always been leading us into the future.

See also:

• The evolution of the theory of evolution
• Strange things that do exist: Computational Origami at MIT
• Social networks from the Enlightement
• Can you take a hint?

How big is our universe?

We often feel alone and unprotected in this vast universe. But really, how big is our universe? This fascinating interactive animation explores the known universe, from Quantum foam to the Virgo Galactic Group.

via PSFK

See also:

• The evolution of the theory of evolution
• Science distilled in a phrase
• A tale of twins (or how to explain relativity theory)
• The meta-infograph

Science distilled in a phrase

“Knowledge is a public good and increases in value as the number of people possessing it increases.”
—John Wilbanks, Creative Commons.

“Frequently, the way to understand a complicated system is to understand its component parts, but that’s probably not the case for the most interesting complicated systems—like us.”
—Robert Sapolsky, Stanford University.

Seed magazine asked leading scientists to summarize the most important lesson to be drawn from their field of study in a single sentence. See what they said here.

Make up your mind about your mind

Everybody has one. A conscious mind I mean. And with it comes the self-referential ability of theorizing about it. Philosophers of Mind, Cognitive Scientists, Neuroscientist and Religious Scholars have all put out theories on what consciousness is (especially in the last 20 years it has become a hot topic of study,and, believe it or not, zombies have central role).

So, where do I stand on the consciousness debate? That’s what Information is Beautiful told me:

What is Consciousness? Make up your mind is a short and sweet web app that gives you an overview of the main theories of Consciousness, lets you choose what you find more plausible and in the end hits you with an almost post-modern description of your theory.

P.S. I actually am not a Identity Theorizing Emergent Dualistic Higher Order Theorist.

See also:

• On faces
• What should I read?
• A tale of twins (or how to explain relativity theory)
• The placebo effect

Antikythera mechanism explained by LEGO

The Antikythera mechanism is impressive on its own means. If you don’t know or are too bored to check Wikipedia, the Antikythera mechanism is one of the most important archeological artifacts ever found, so mind-blowing that it could very well headline an Indiana Jones adventure.

Discovered in 1901 in the Antikythera ship wreck (in the first instance of underwater archeology) and dating back to Ancient Greece (150-100 BC), it is a very complex calculator for astronomical events, with impressive accuracy. In fact, it precedes any other known clockwork mechanism of similar complexity by more than a millennium! Figuring out what the mechanism does was no piece of cake either. It took almost 100 years and impressive technology.

And it simply takes 3 minutes and a reconstruction made of LEGOs to explain its logic, in this great video that won Best Nature Video, as voted by Nature Network readers.

via GOOD.IS

See also:

• A tale of twins (or how to explain relativity theory)
• Strange things that do exist: Computational Origami at MIT
• 3D geopolitical maps out of LEGO

Don’t miss super full moon

Today,the 19th of March, the moon will appear to be 14% larger, the biggest in almost 20 years. Don’t miss it.

The placebo effect

When comparing placebos, a bigger pill is more effective. This and more mind-blowing placebo facts in this cool kinetic infograph video:

See also:

• A tale of twins (or how to explain relativity theory)
• Line mutations
• The meme meme

Strange things that do exist: Computational Origami at MIT

MIT prof. Erik Demaine (a homeschooled prodigy who enrolled in University at 12 and became the youngest faculty member at MIT at 20 years old) teaches such courses as Geometric Folding Algorithms: Linkages, Origami, Polyhedra (video lectures available online).

Demaine is a mathematician, but also an origami artist himself with exhibits in MoMA’s permanent collection:

[And if you are wondering why MIT holds courses in origami, this is the reason: origami folding techniques are used in industrial products like airbags, and, especially, in space technology with objects such as foldable telescopes and satellite wings]

Related Articles

• MIT Researchers Develop Self-Folding Origami, Programmable Material (techeblog.com)

Read it elsewhere

It’s link time, again.

• Egypt initially blocks Twitter and Facebook and now cuts off all access to internet but Egyptians are still tweeting for freedom –guardian/bbc
• it has happened. During the holidays kindle books outsold paperback books on Amazon – dvice
• 15 free, non-pirate, Hitchcock movies online – openculture
• you already knew that the Martin Luther King “I have a dream” speech was brilliant, but now there is the infogram to prove it – fastcodesign
• apparently you can now earn a degree at The Beatles – ctv
• this, below, is a photograph (of soap bubbles), not an illustration; see more psychedelic images in science – discover