The Art of Science: Science and Art are Not as Different as We Think – Kristin LeVier, TEDxUIdaho

Screenshot of Zoe Keller's graphite illustration, LIMUW | Santa Cruz Island, California, shown in TEDxUIdaho talk by Kristin LeVier (via Youtube at 4:23 min)

Can a person be both a scientist and an artist? The answer is a resounding yes.

Discover what breath-taking works can be produced by artists who find inspiration from the intersection of art and science. Kristin LeVier is an artist who creates contemporary organic sculptures inspired by the complex, breathtaking spectacle of the natural world. She’s an MIT-trained former molecular biologist whose mission as an artist is to create innovative sculpture at the intersection of art and science..

Climate Change Enables the Spread of a Dangerous Flesh-Eating Bacteria in US Coastal Waters, Study Says – Inside Climate News

False color scanning electron micrograph of w:en: Vibrio vulnificus bacteria (courtesy of CDC Image Library / James Gathany (PHIL #7815), Public domain, via Wikimedia).

Cases of a potentially fatal infection from a seawater-borne pathogen have increased off the U.S. Atlantic coast as ocean waters warmed over the last 30 years, and are expected to rise further in future because of climate change, according to a study published on Thursday by Scientific Reports, an open-access journal for research on the natural sciences and other topics…

Morgan Maassen

spending long hot days in the Maldives is equal parts intense as it is stunning. when the sun rises at 5am and sets at 9pm, the heat kills you and even the ocean is not refreshing to swim in. at high noon, when the heat surpasses 35c and everyone hides in the shade, i find the colors to be most vibrant: the rich blues of the sea, the blinding white sand, and the lush green jungle of the islands... it takes my breath away. i love photographing there, but i won't lie... it can be more intense than idyllic.

when i was 18 and first started exploring photography, i immediately became obsessed with shooting at night. i’d explore Santa Barbara by bike, spending long sleepless nights huddling up near any body of water or clear vantage point, to then fumble with a self-timer, trying to align a composition that wasn’t blurry or under-exposed. with so much trial and error throughout the years, it has become one of my favorite methodologies to shoot… for its slow, peaceful measure and way of observing the world in minute-long intervals, breathes new awe into the most simple of moments. – Morgan Maassen

Cruise Ship Invasion Interactive Feature – Hakai

Golden Princess - Alaska (by Jasperdo CC BY-NC-ND 2.0 via Flickr).

Elizabeth Burton, a Seattle-based activist with the organization Seattle Cruise Control, calculated that the total climate impact of a typical Alaska cruising season, beginning and ending in Seattle (including flights), is equivalent to one-third of the city’s entire annual carbon emissions…After a one-year pandemic pause and a limited season in 2021, cruises to Alaska resumed and surged in popularity in 2022…an estimated 700,000 passengers will depart Seattle, Washington, on hundreds of different cruises. These travelers voyage on increasingly massive ships—some about three sport fields in length—that can house, feed, and process the waste of upward of 4,000 human beings…

China’s Mekong dams turn Thai fishing villages into ‘ghost towns’- Context

Mekong River (by Dominique Bergeron CC BY-NC-ND 2.0 via Flickr).

From February to April each year, Kam Thon spends most of her days knee-deep in the waters of the Mekong River by her village in northern Thailand, gathering river weed to sell and cook at home. Kam Thon and other women who live by the Mekong have been collecting river weed, or khai, for decades, but their harvest has fallen since China built nearly a dozen dams upstream. The dams have altered the flow of water and block much of the sediment that is vital for khai and rice cultivation, researchers say…

Bomb cyclone, atmospheric river, polar vortex: How our weather terminology has grown with recent wild storms – the Los Angeles Times

March 31 - April 1, 2023 Satellite animation showing weather patterns off the coast of California (courtesy of NOAA)

Californians have been warned over the past few months about weather ranging from a “vicious heat dome” to back-to-back “atmospheric rivers,” and the always-concerning “bomb cyclone.” While it might feel as though recent weather has been dominated by a string of new phenomena, experts say these terms and events are well-established in the scientific world but simply novel to much of general public…

New Land Creation on Waterfronts Increasing, Study Finds – AGU

Satellite view comparison of Hangzhou Bay, 40 miles from downtown Shanghai in 2016 (left) and 2019 (courtesy NASA Earth Observatory, by Joshua Stevens using Landsat data from the US Geological Survey).

Humans have added approximately 900 square miles of land to urban coastlines this century, and we’re building more…

Humans are artificially expanding cities’ coastlines by extending industrial ports and creating luxury residential waterfronts. Developers have added over 2,530 square kilometers of land (900 square miles, or about 40 Manhattans) to coastlines in major cities since 2000, according to a new study…

Microplastics Are Filling the Skies. Will They Affect the Climate? – Yale Environment 360

Micro Plastics in Arctic Snow (by Felton Davis CC BY 2.0 via Flickr).

Recent studies reveal that tiny pieces of plastic are constantly lofted into the atmosphere. These particles can travel thousands of miles and affect the formation of clouds, which means they have the potential to impact temperature, rainfall, and even climate change.

Plastic has become an obvious pollutant over recent decades, choking turtles and seabirds, clogging up our landfills and waterways. But in just the past few years, a less-obvious problem has emerged…