Thermite Reaction Creating Molten Iron
Thermite is a pyrotechnic composition of a metal powder and a metal oxide, which produces an exothermic oxidation-reduction reaction known as a thermite reaction. If aluminum is the reducing agent it is called an aluminothermic reaction. Most varieties are not explosive, but can create short bursts of extremely high temperatures focused on a very small area for a short period of time.
Abberant Ammonite Fossil, Ancyloceras matheranianum, Lower Cretaceous, Russia
Ammonites are the common name given to the Ammonoidea, an extinct order of cephalopods. These relatives of today's squid, octopi, and Nautilus were abundant, intelligent, active, and predatory molluscs that lived in shallow (100 meters or less) marine environments throughout the world.
Kilauea Lava Flow entering the sea, 2001 August, Big Island of Hawaii
Kilauea is an active volcano in the Hawaiian Islands, one of five shield volcanoes that together form the island of Hawaii. It is the most recent of a series of volcanoes that have created the Hawaiian archipelago, as the Pacific Plate moves over the Hawaii hotspot. Kilauea means "spewing" or "much spreading" in the Hawaiian language, referring to its frequent outpouring of lava. The Puʻu ʻŌʻō cone has been continuously erupting in the eastern rift-zone since 1983, making it the longest rift-zone eruption of the last 200 years. Thirty-four eruptions have taken place since 1952, not including the current episode. Lava less than 1000 years old covers 90% of Kilauea and the volume of erupted material is large enough to pave a road across the world three times.
Common House Fly
The housefly (also house fly, house-fly or common housefly), Musca domestica, is a fly of the Brachycera suborder. It is the most common of all domestic flies, accounting for about 90% of all flies in human habitations, and indeed one of the most widely distributed insects, found all over the world; it is considered a pest that can carry serious diseases.
Red Hot Horseshoe - Black Body Radiation
A black body is an idealized physical body that absorbs all incident electromagnetic radiation. Because of this perfect absorptivity at all wavelengths, a black body is also the best possible emitter of thermal radiation, which it radiates incandescently in a characteristic, continuous spectrum that depends on the body's temperature.
Bluegill Fish, Lepomis macrochirus
The Bluegill (Lepomis macrochirus) is a species of freshwater fish sometimes referred to as bream, brim, or copper nose. It is a member of the sunfish family Centrarchidae of the order Perciformes. It is native to a wide area of North America, from Québec to northern Mexico, and has been widely transplanted to stock game fish for anglers.
Pyrite in Talc, Amejun, Lograno, Spain
The mineral pyrite, or iron pyrite, is an iron sulfide with the formula FeS2. This mineral's metallic luster and pale-to-normal, brass-yellow hue have earned it the nickname fool's gold because of its resemblance to gold.
Carpenter Bee at Butterfly Bush Flower, Xylocopa sp
Carpenter bees (the genus Xylocopa in the subfamily Xylocopinae) are large, hairy bees distributed worldwide. There are some 500 species of carpenter bee in 31 subgenera. Their name comes from the fact that nearly all species build their nests in burrows in dead wood, bamboo, or structural timbers (except those in the subgenus Proxylocopa, which nest in the ground). Members of the related tribe Ceratinini are sometimes referred to as "small carpenter bees".
Very Large Array - Radio Telescope in Socorro, New Mexico
An astronomical interferometer is an array of telescopes or mirror segments acting together to probe structures with higher resolution by means of interferometry. The benefit of the interferometer is that the angular resolution of the instrument is nearly that of a telescope with the same aperture as a single large instrument encompassing all of the individual photon-collecting sub-components. Astronomical interferometers can produce higher-resolution astronomical images than any other type of telescope. At radio wavelengths image resolutions of a few micro-arcseconds have been obtained, and image resolutions of a fractional milliarcsecond have been achieved at visible and infrared wavelengths.
Dandelion Seeds Study
Taraxacum is a large genus of flowering plants in the family Asteraceae. They are native to Eurasia and North America, and two species, T. officinale and T. erythrospermum, are found as weeds worldwide.
Firefly's Twilight Flight
Lampyridae is a family of insects in the beetle order Coleoptera. They are winged beetles, and commonly called fireflies or lightning bugs for their conspicuous crepuscular use of bioluminescence to attract mates or prey. Fireflies produce a "cold light", with no infrared or ultraviolet frequencies. This chemically produced light from the lower abdomen may be yellow, green, or pale-red, with wavelengths from 510 to 670 nanometers.
Dry Ice, Frozen Carbon Dioxide
Dry ice, sometimes referred to as "Cardice" or as "card ice" is the solid form of carbon dioxide. Dry ice is the solid form of carbon dioxide (chemical formula: CO2), comprising two oxygen atoms bonded to a single carbon atom. It is colorless, odorless, non-flammable, and slightly acidic.
The San Andreas Fault, Carrizo Plain, California
The San Andreas Fault is a continental transform fault that runs a length of roughly 810 miles through California in the United States. The fault's motion is right-lateral strike-slip (horizontal motion). It forms the tectonic boundary between the Pacific Plate and the North American Plate.
Walking Stick Face
The Phasmatodea (sometimes called Phasmida) are an order of insects, whose members are variously known as stick insects (in Europe and Australasia), walking sticks or stick-bugs (in the United States and Canada), phasmids, ghost insects and leaf insects (generally the family Phylliidae). The ordinal name is derived from the Ancient Greek phasma, meaning an apparition or phantom, and refers to the resemblance of many species to sticks or leaves. Their natural camouflage can make them extremely difficult to spot.
Evening Bat Exodus, Mexican Freetail Bats, Carlsbad Caverns NP, New Mexico
The Mexican Free-tailed Bat is widely regarded as one of the most abundant mammals in North America and is not on any federal lists. However, its proclivity towards roosting in large numbers in relatively few roosts makes it especially vulnerable to human disturbance and habitat destruction.
Exploding Soda Can
In late 18th century, scientists made important progress in replicating naturally carbonated mineral waters. In 1767, Englishman Joseph Priestley first discovered a method of infusing water with carbon dioxide to make carbonated water which has 3.4 mg in the drink when he suspended a bowl of distilled water above a beer vat at a local brewery in Leeds, England.
Fluorite with Calcite, El Mamman, Meknes, Morocco
Fluorite (also called fluorspar) is a halide mineral composed of calcium fluoride, CaF2. It is an isometric mineral with a cubic habit, though octahedral and more complex isometric forms are not uncommon. Crystal twinning is common and adds complexity to the observed crystal habits.
Green Clearwing Dragonfly (Erythemis simpliciollis) Chasing a Red Milkweed Beetle (Tetraopes tetraophthalmus)
The Eastern Pondhawk (Erythemis simplicicollis), also known as the Common Pondhawk, is a dragonfly of the family Libellulidae, native to the eastern two-thirds of the United States and southern Ontario, Canada. The species is distinguished in that the female is bright green and the adult male is nearly entirely blue.
Superconductivity... Samarium Cobalt Magnet Floats over a Super Cooled Yttruim Barium Copper Oxide Composite Disc
Yttrium barium copper oxide, often abbreviated YBCO, is a crystalline chemical compound with the formula YBa2Cu3O7. This material, a famous "high-temperature superconductor", achieved prominence because it was the first material to achieve superconductivity above the boiling point of nitrogen.
YBCO was the first material to become superconducting above 77 K, the boiling point of nitrogen. All materials developed before 1986 became superconducting only at temperatures near the boiling points of liquid helium or liquid hydrogen (Tb = 20.28 K) - the highest being Nb3Ge at 23 K. The significance of the discovery of YBCO is the much lower cost of the refrigerant used to cool the material to below the critical temperature.
Hitchhiker Seeds - Common Burdock
Burdock, also known as lesser burdock, wild rhubarb, clothbur, beggar's buttons or gypsy's rhubarb, is any of a group of biennial thistles in the genus Arctium, family Asteraceae. Native to the Old World, several species have been widely introduced worldwide. The prickly heads of these plants (burrs) are noted for easily catching on to fur and clothing, thus providing an excellent mechanism for seed dispersal.
After taking his dog for a walk one day in the early 1940s, George de Mestral, a Swiss inventor, became curious about the seeds of the burdock plant that had attached themselves to his clothes and to the dog's fur. Under a microscope, he looked closely at the hook-and-loop system that the seeds use to hitchhike on passing animals aiding seed dispersal, and he realized that the same approach could be used to join other things together. The result was Velcro.
Iguana Portrait, Florida
Iguana is a genus of lizard native to tropical areas of Central and South America and the Caribbean. Two species are included in the genus Iguana: the Green Iguana, which is widespread throughout its range and a popular pet, and the Lesser Antillean Iguana, which is endemic to the Lesser Antilles and endangered due to habitat destruction.
Laser Bar Code Scanner
A barcode reader (or barcode scanner) is an electronic device for reading printed barcodes. Like a flatbed scanner, it consists of a light source, a lens and a light sensor translating optical impulses into electrical ones. Additionally, nearly all barcode readers contain decoder circuitry analyzing the barcode's image data provided by the sensor and sending the barcode's content to the scanner's output port.
Light Refracting on Bubble Film Surface
A soap bubble is a very thin film of soapy water that forms a sphere with an iridescent surface. Soap bubbles usually last for only a few seconds before bursting, either on their own or on contact with another object. They are often used for children's enjoyment, but they are also used in artistic performances. Soap bubbles can help solve complex mathematical problems of space, as they will always find the smallest surface area between points or edges.
Crane Fly Face Up Close
Crane flies are insects in the family Tipulidae. Adults are very slender, long-legged flies that may vary in length from 2–60 millimeters. Numerous other common names have been applied to the crane fly, many of them more or less regional, including mosquito hawk, mosquito eater, skeeter eater, gallinipper, and gollywhopper. At least 4256 species of crane flies have been described.
Low Tide - Cape Cod Bay - Massachusetts
Cape Cod, often referred to locally as simply the Cape, is an island and a cape in the easternmost portion of the state of Massachusetts, in the Northeastern United States. It is coextensive with Barnstable County.
Marine Reptile, Mosasaurus, Cretaceous Oceans, Belgium
Mosasaurus (“lizard of the Meuse River") was a genus of mosasaur, a carnivorous, aquatic lizard, somewhat resembling a flippered crocodile, with elongated heavy jaws. The genus lived in the Maastrichtian age of the Cretaceous period (Mesozoic era), around 70-65 millions years ago in the area of modern Western Europe.
Mauna Loa Eruption, Big Island of Hawaii
Mauna Loa is the largest volcano on Earth in terms of volume and area covered and one of five volcanoes that form the Island of Hawaii in the U.S. state of Hawaii in the Pacific Ocean. It is an active shield volcano, with a volume estimated at approximately 18,000 cubic miles.
River of Lava Flowing Toward Hilo, Mauna Loa Eruption, Big Island of Hawaii 4/84
Mauna Loa has probably been erupting for at least 700,000 years and may have emerged above sea level about 400,000 years ago, although the oldest-known dated rocks are not older than 200,000 years. Its magma comes from the Hawaii hotspot, which has been responsible for the creation of the Hawaiian island chain for tens of millions of years. The slow drift of the Pacific Plate will eventually carry the Mauna Loa away from the hotspot, and it will then become extinct within 500,000 to one million years from now.
Mexican Wolf, Canis lupus baileyi, Arizona
The Mexican Wolf (Canis lupus baileyi) is a subspecies of the Gray Wolf. It is native to North America, where it is the rarest and most genetically distinct subspecies.
Milkweed Seed Dispersal
Milkweed Seed Flight
Milkweed is named for its milky juice, which contains alkaloids, latex, and several other complex compounds including cardenolides. Some species are known to be toxic. Carl Linnaeus named the genus after Asclepius, the Greek god of healing, because of the many folk-medicinal uses for the milkweed plants.
Molecule of Chlorophyll
Chlorophyll is a green pigment found in almost all plants, algae, and cyanobacteria. Chlorophyll is an extremely important biomolecule, critical in photosynthesis, which allows plants to obtain energy from light. Chlorophyll absorbs light most strongly in the blue portion of the electromagnetic spectrum, followed by the red portion.
Mt. St. Helen's Smoking Caldera 1980, Washington
Mount St. Helens is an active stratovolcano located in Skamania County, Washington, in the Pacific Northwest region of the United States. It is 96 miles south of Seattle, Washington and 50 miles northeast of Portland, Oregon. The volcano is located in the Cascade Range and is part of the Cascade Volcanic Arc, a segment of the Pacific Ring of Fire that includes over 160 active volcanoes. This volcano is well known for its ash explosions and pyroclastic flows.
Native Copper, Ajo, Arizona
Copper is a chemical element with the symbol Cu (Latin: cuprum) and atomic number 29. It is a ductile metal, with very high thermal and electrical conductivity. Pure copper is rather soft and malleable, and a freshly exposed surface has a reddish-orange color. It is used as a thermal conductor, an electrical conductor, a building material, and a constituent of various metal alloys.
Paleontologists Excavating Colombian Mammoth Remains, The Mammoth Site, South Dakota
The Mammoth Site is a museum and paleontological site near Hot Springs, South Dakota. It contains the remains of fauna and flora preserved by entrapment in a karst sinkhole during the Pleistocene era. Mammoth bones were found at the site in 1974, and a museum and building enclosing the site were established. The museum now contains an extensive collection of mammoth remains.
Common Whitetail Dragonfly
The Common Whitetail or Long-tailed Skimmer (Libellula Lydia, also Plathemis lydia ) is a common dragonfly across much of North America, with a striking and unusual appearance. The Common Whitetail can be seen hawking for mosquitoes and other small flying insects over ponds, marshes, and slow-moving rivers in most regions except the higher mountain regions.
Photo Voltaic Solar Panels Convert Sunlight into Electricity
A photovoltaic array or a solar array is a linked collection of photovoltaic modules, which are in turn made of multiple interconnected solar cells. By their modularity, they are able to be configured to supply most loads. The cells convert solar energy into direct current electricity via the photovoltaic effect.
Plesippus shoshoensis, Fossil Horse Head, Pliocene,Hagerman Lake, Idaho
Plesippus is often considered an intermediary stage between Dinohippus and the present day genus, Equus. The famous fossils found near Hagerman, Idaho were originally thought to be a part of the genus Plesippus Hagerman Fossil Beds (in Idaho), a Pliocene site, dating about 3.5 Mya ago.
Reaction: 1 Molar (left)& 3 Molar Acetic Acid (right) & Baking Soda Generating Carbon Dioxide
Molarity (in units of mol/L, molar, or M) or molar concentration denotes the number of moles of a given substance per liter of solution. A capital letter M is used to abbreviate units of mol/L .
Scolecite, Mahodori Quarry, Nasik, India
Scolecite is a tectosilicate mineral belonging to the zeolite group; it is a hydrated calcium silicate. Scolecite, like natrolite and mesolite, usually occurs as acicular (needle-like) and fibrous aggregations. It has nearly the same angles between the crystal faces as does natrolite, but natrolite is orthorhombic and scolecite is monoclinic.
Silk Moth Laying Eggs, Comet Moth, Argema mittrei, Argentina
The Comet moth (Argema mittrei) or Madagascan moon moth is an African moth, native to the rain forests of Madagascar. The male has a wingspan of twenty centimeters and a tail span of fifteen centimeters, making it one of the world's largest silk moths. The female lays from 120-170 eggs, and after hatching the larvae feed on Eugenia and Weinmannia leaves for approximately two months before pupating.
Six-spotted Green Tiger Beetle Cicindela sexguttata
Adult beetles are fast runners and fliers. When they fly, they usually stay within three feet of the ground. Tiger beetles catch prey on the ground and in the air. Six-spotted Tiger Beetles eat small insects, spiders, and other arthropods. Favorite foods include other beetles, springtails, sawflies, caterpillars, flies, ants, and grasshoppers.
Spewing Lava, Mauna Loa Eruption, Big Island of Hawaii, Hawaii Volcanoes Nat'l Park 4/1984
Mauna Loa's most recent eruption occurred from 24 March 1984, to 15 April 1984. No recent eruptions of the volcano have caused fatalities, but eruptions in 1926 and 1950 destroyed villages, and the city of Hilo is partly built on lava flows from the late 19th century. In view of the hazards it poses to population centers, Mauna Loa is part of the Decade Volcanoes program, which encourages studies of the most dangerous volcanoes. Mauna Loa has been intensively monitored by the Hawaiian Volcano Observatory since 1912. Observations of the atmosphere are undertaken at the Mauna Loa Observatory, and of the Sun at the Mauna Loa Solar Observatory, both located near its summit. Hawaii Volcanoes National Park covers the summit and the southeastern flank of the volcano, including a separate volcano, Kilauea.
Spined Soldier Bug, Podisus spp.
Podisus maculiventris, the spined soldier bug is a species of insect common in North America. They are predators of gypsy moth caterpillars and the larvae of beetles such as the Colorado potato beetle and the Mexican bean beetle. Because they eat Mexican bean beetles, they are regarded as good things to have in the garden.
Badlands National Monument, South Dakota
Badlands National Park, in southwest South Dakota, preserves 244,000 acres of sharply eroded buttes, pinnacles, and spires blended with the largest protected mixed grass prairie in the United States.
Tiger Swallowtail Butterfly, Papilio glaucus
The Eastern Tiger Swallowtail (Papilio glaucus) is a species of swallowtail butterfly native to North America. It is one of the most familiar butterflies in the eastern United States. Eastern Tiger Swallowtails are diurnal, and are usually solitary. Adults are known to fly high above the ground, usually seen above the tree canopy. Males seek females by patrolling habitats containing the larval host plants. During courtship, the male and female fly about each other prior to landing and mating. The male releases perfume-like pheromones during courtship to entice the female into mating.
Water Strider, Gerris sp
The family Gerridae contains insects commonly known as water striders, water bugs, magic bugs, pond skaters, skaters, skimmers, water scooters, water skaters, water skeeters, water skimmers, water skippers, water spiders, or Jesus bugs. These are predatory insects, which rely on surface tension to walk on top of water.
Wolf Spider Carrying Babies on her Back, Hogna frondicola
Wolf spiders are members of the family Lycosidae, from the Ancient Greek word meaning "wolf". They are robust and agile hunters with good eyesight.
Wolf spiders are unique in the way that they carry their eggs. The egg sac, a round silken globe, is attached to the spinnerets at the end of the abdomen, allowing the spider to carry her unborn young with her. The abdomen must be held in a raised position to keep the egg case from dragging on the ground, however despite this handicap they are still capable of hunting. Another aspect unique to wolf spiders is their method of infant care. Immediately after the spiderlings emerge from their protective silken case, they clamber up their mother's legs and crowd onto her abdomen.
Yellow Aphids on Milkweed Leaf - Aphis nerii
Aphids, also known as plant lice and in Britain and the Commonwealth as greenflies, blackflies or whiteflies, are small sap sucking insects, and members of the super family Aphidoidea. Aphids are among the most destructive insect pests on cultivated plants in temperate regions. The damage they do to plants has made them enemies of farmers and gardeners the world over, but from a zoological standpoint they are a very successful group of organisms. Their success is in part due to the asexual reproduction capability of some species.