The Earliest Days of NASA
Maria Popova, at Brain Pickings, happened upon a treasure trove of early NASA (and its airplane-only predecessor NACA) archive photos. They are really something. From biplanes to the Mercury capsule, pre-1950 aeronautics seemed to live by the motto of “If we build it, then we can go there.” That’s a sentiment we could use a bit more of.
Yes please!
It’s Tuesday’s peek into the archives!
Taxidermist George Adams constructs the foundation for a Moa bird model, June 1951.© AMNH Library/2A2584
(via scientificillustration)
life:
Photos from the annual bee market at Veenendaal — “the biggest in Europe,” according to LIFE.
“She was a dull person, but a sensational invitation to make babies.”
— Kurt Vonnegut, Slaughterhouse Five
The effect shown in the gif is called gravitational lensing.
What is gravitational lensing?
Gravitational lensing is the effect seen when an object behind a massive object is in the line of sight with the earth. For example:
Earth ————>Massive Object—————->Far away object
When we try looking at the far away object, the massive object bends space-time around it, causing the light rays from the far away object to travel in a curved path around into our line of sight.
As a result of this, we can often see the far away object magnified which helps astronomers understand the early universe. The gif shows a far away galaxy being gravitationally lensed by a closer black hole.
(via physicsphysics)
A cicada shedding its skin.
Andre de Dienes
1950s
