Eclectic Perambulations in the Noosphere
Monday 23 January 2012
It has taken eight years and more than a million Madagascar Golden Orb spiders to create a work of art "with the quality of a fairy story". And it goes on display at London's V&A museum this week.
Simon Peers and Nicholas Godley, a textile artist and a designer-entrepreneur respectively, have created a shimmering golden cape from spider silk, a fabric not woven in more than a century.
by *Blepharopsis
"Projection of confocal microscope optical sections showing three out of eight (but you may flip it along the vertical axis and you end up having six - 75% success rate!) eyes of a jumping spider.
It's funny how the eyes of the spider remind rather those of vertebrates than insects - they are simple, as opposite to compound, have single large lens and a retina.
The two big Anterior Median eyes in the middle are long and tubular and hence have longer focal length, something akin to a telephoto lens, but which means they have a narrow field of view.
The narrow field of view means that the spider has to move its body to see in different directions, however, the eyes can move as well - or rather the retina, since the eyes are build in the carapace. You can see the retina, composed of 4 layers of tiny sensory cells, in the middle of the image. The muscles thatt accoplish its movement are visible below the lens as two bright blue tripes.
Nuclei - red (also, autofluorescence of the lenses' "coating")
Actin - blue"
Image Credit Flickr User Jurgen Otto
Australia is home to many strange and unusual animals, something the majority of us know. When asked, most people would say that it is the marsupials of the country that are the most significantly different to the rest of the world. Perhaps that assumption should be questioned – Australia is also home to the tiny Peacock Spider, whose behaviour and appearance is nothing short of startling.
via arkinspace.com
" Apis mellifera, the most commonly domesticated species, is native to Europe, Asia and Africa. It is also called the Western honeybee. There are many sub-species that have adapted to the environment of their geographic and climatic area. Behavior, color and anatomy can be quite different from one sub-species to another. The sub-species Apis mellifera mellifera was brought to the Americas with the first colonists to Virginia in 1622, and numerous other occasions later. Many of the crops that depend on honeybees for pollination have also been imported since colonial times. Escaped swarms spread rapidly as far as the Great Plains, usually preceding the colonists. The Native Americans called the honeybee "the white man's fly." Honeybees did not naturally cross the Rockies; they were carried by ship to California in the early 1850s."
Millions of spiders have crawled into trees in Pakistan to escape flood waters, shrouding them with their silky webs.
The eye-catching phenomenon is an unexpected side-effect of last year's flooding which claimed the lives of almost 2,000 people.
However, since the monsoon weather devastated the nation last July, much of the water has still not yet receded.
The tiny arachnids have sought refuge amongst the trees weaving beautifully intricate webs between the leaves. Locals say there are now fewer mosquitos reducing the risk of malaria
The branches are now so cocooned in spiders webs it gives the appearance of them being shrouded in a large net.
People in this part of Sindh, in south eastern Pakistan, near Karachi, have never seen this phenomenon before, but locals are reporting that there are now fewer mosquitos than they would expect, given the amount of stagnant, standing water that is around.
Photographer: John Adam
"This picture of a carefully constructed spider web was taken in Washington Oaks Gardens State Park, Flagler County, Florida. It was about 10 inches (25 cm) in diameter and exhibited greenish and pink iridescence when the viewing angle was “just right.”"
"Jumping spiders are often very colourful spiders. Maratus volans is not an exception.
Although tiny, male spiders have an iridescent colouring of red, green and blue."
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