Phyllodoce lineata
Phyllodoce lineata Watch as the middle is scooped out of this polychaete, which appears simultaneously fleshy and skeletal. Video: Sarah Faulwetter, Hellenic Centre for Marine Research/YouTube
View ArticleSea urchin
Sea urchin Resembling a stumpy marine porcupine, the prickly sea urchin's spikes pack a punch. But wait until you see what's inside this echinoderm: crazy, five-fold symmetry. Video: Sarah Faulwetter,...
View ArticleSyllis gracilis
Syllis gracilis The big drain-like tube running down the middle of this bizarre-looking worm is the polychaete's intestine. "Since the family Syllidae, to which Syllis belongs, is my favorite family of...
View ArticleFeb 6, 2013
Pretty Veils in Orion This esthetic close-up of cosmic clouds and stellar winds features LL Orionis, interacting with the Orion Nebula flow. Adrift in Orion's stellar nursery and still in its formative...
View ArticleBig Obsidian Flow, Newberry Caldera
Big Obsidian Flow, Oregon If we head north, we reach another bimodal caldera that sits behind the main arc of Cascade volcanoes -- this time, Newberry Caldera in Oregon. On the southern wall of the...
View ArticleCordon Caulle, Chile
Cordón Caulle, Chile The folks at NASA's Earth Observatory posted one of the best images of a lava flow I've seen in a long time this week -- it shows the dark obsidian flow from the 2011-12 activity...
View ArticleGlass Creek Dome, California
Glass Creek Dome, California Here is another rhyolitic dome in the Long Valley area, this time as part of the Inyo Chain. There are multiple domes that run roughly north-south along the Sierran front...
View ArticleEntrainment of material in Rock Mesa lava
Clasts entrained in obsidian flows from Rock Mesa, Oregon In fact, in some places you can find layers of entrained chunks of other rocks -- possibly picked up off the ground surface as the flow was...
View ArticleGlass Mountain, California
Glass Mountain, California One set of the obsidian flows I have yet to visit are in and around the Medicine Lake caldera. Glass Mountain, Little Glass Mountain, Crater Glass Flow and the Medicine Lake...
View ArticlePuffed obsidian from Panum Dome
"Puffed obsidian" from Panum Crater This close-up view of some of the rhyolite that makes up Panum Dome shows some of the neat features of glassy volcanic lava. You can clearly see the dark, dense...
View ArticlePanum Crater, California
Panum Crater, California Near the north end of the Mono Craters in eastern California, Panum crater is a small rhyolite dome that formed only ~660 years ago (the youngest of our western North America...
View ArticleObsidian flow from Rock Mesa, Oregon
Swirling lava from Rock Mesa, Oregon The rhyodacite lavas from Rock Mesa are some of the strangest I've seen, with very glassy carapace (outer layer) than was almost greenish. There was also abundant...
View ArticleSouth Sister and dome field, Oregon
South Sister domes, Oregon South Sister is a composite volcano that is part of the Three Sisters volcanic cluster -- it is also the youngest and most active, but not from the summit crater. The...
View ArticleNewberry Flow and South Sister, Oregon
Newberry Flow at South Sister, Oregon The largest of the Devil's Hills is the Newberry Flow, the highest up on the flanks of South Sister. In this view, you can clearly see the pressure ridges of the...
View ArticleFeb 8, 2013
Halley's Comet in 1986 A great historical shot from the most recent pass of Halley's Comet in 1986. The Milky Way shines brightly to the right of the comet in this image. Image: ESO [high-resolution]...
View ArticleFeb 9, 2013
Color Crater on Mercury Though Mercury is not known for having an especially colorful surface, some regions show a strong local contrast in color. Like other craters in Caloris, the interior and ejecta...
View ArticleFeb 10, 2013
Wings of the Seagull Nebula This image shows the intricate structure of part of the Seagull Nebula, known more formally as IC 2177. These wisps of gas and dust are known as Sharpless 2-296 (officially...
View ArticleHumans Smell Worse
Humans Smell Worse Well, we don't exactly smell worse, not in the hold-your-nose sense. But there's reason to think our sense of smell has ossified: Unlike most animals, we no longer rely on that sense...
View ArticleHumans Are Becoming Dumber. Or Not.
Humans Are Becoming Dumber. Or Not. It's easy to think that evolution has a purpose, that it optimizes design in some predictable, self-evidently appealing way. On the grand scale, this is probably...
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Humanity 2.0: Now More Evolvable
It's easy to think humans have stopped evolving, but nothing could be further from the truth. Though modern medicine and civilization's graces make the struggle to survive more subtle, evolution's...
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