Visibly Shaken

Big science vs small science

Peter Griffin — Mon, 20 May 2013 22:21:16 +0000

We hear a lot about “big science” these days – the Large Hadron Collider being a prime example of science on a vast and hugely expensive scale. What are some of the big science projects of history – and how do they compare to relatively “small science” projects when it comes to the knowledge they have generated for mankind?

This infographic lays out some of the major discoveries in both camps.

Source: NonProfitCollegesOnline.com

Mapping the history of hurricanes

John Kerr — Fri, 24 Aug 2012 04:37:11 +0000

One hundred and fifty years of tropical storms have been captured in this image from Data visualiser John Nelson, map manager for IDV Solutions.

The graphic, looking at the globe with Antarctica in the centre, shows the intensity and location of hurricanes, cyclones and typhoons since 1851, based on data from United States’ National Climate Data Center. Read more about the image on the IDV Blog.

Click to enlarge

Infographic: The impact of the US drought

Peter Griffin — Mon, 30 Jul 2012 23:35:17 +0000

The United States is experiencing its worst drought since 1988, with the U.S. Department of Agriculture having declared area covering one third of US counties a federal disaster area

What’s the impact of all of this – on agricultural production, on prices for food commodities? The Daily Observer, a paper from Ottawa, Canada, published the infographic below to sum up the drought’s consequences…

Crime scene science (infographic)

Peter Griffin — Tue, 12 Jun 2012 22:03:48 +0000

Interested in how blood splatter patterns are analysed – and what they mean? Want to know what happens in an autopsy? it’s all here in this fascinating infographic on the science of crime scene investigations – its like CSI without having to watch the lame TV shows…

(Click to enlarge)

Source: eLocalLawyers.com

The bulk of the nation (infographic)

Peter Griffin — Fri, 24 Feb 2012 01:00:16 +0000

If you bought a paper this morning, particularly the Herald, you’ll have bene greated with front-page stories detailing a list of 49 foods that obese people should avoid.

In fact, we should probably all avoid them, but University of Otago researchers who put the list together, are targeting people who are overweight or obese and suggesting foods they can swap out these so-called NEEDN’T foods for.

We held a press conference with the researchers yesterday, which you can listen to here.

So how many of us are overweight or obese? We’ve an infographic for you with the answers. We put this together based on extensive data that emerged just before the General Election last year, but which was sort of buried in Rugby World Cup hype and election build-up. See below as well – how the media adapted the graphic to accompany today’s story on the NEEDNT foods.

From The Press

From the Otago Daily Times

New Zealand in 2012 – a snapshot

Peter Griffin — Wed, 25 Jan 2012 21:26:47 +0000

Nice infographic work from Fairfax in today’s Dominion Post showing some key indicators and stats on New Zealand’s population demographics.

Who’d have thought the Aussies have a longer life expectancy than us?

Source: Fairfax

People lie about washing their hands

Peter Griffin — Tue, 06 Dec 2011 21:10:26 +0000

It’s National Handwashing week in the US this week and if you’ve see the movie Contagion, you’ll understand the virtues of lathering up with soap and disinfecting your hands on a regular basis.

The people at Certification Map put together the following useful infographic highlighting the virtues of handwashing and reveals some interesting human behaviour around hand washing and our real and claimed activity in this area…

Via Certification Map — Teacher Credential & : Teacher Certification

Wind farms in New Zealand

John Kerr — Mon, 18 Apr 2011 02:01:53 +0000

We all know that there are wind farms are scattered around New Zealand – but where exactly are they, and who owns them? The infographic below neatly displays the location and ownership of New Zealand’s wind farms. The map was published as part of an article on the economics of wind farms, written by Rob Stock for the Sunday Star Times.

50 years after Gagarin

Peter Griffin — Mon, 11 Apr 2011 03:19:08 +0000

Russia is this week remembering the golden age of its space exploration programme with the 50th anniversary of Yuri Gagarin’s orbit of the Earth, the first manned space flight, which paved the way for human exploration of space.

The Herald on Sunday ran the following useful infographic which breaks down the steps in the historic mission back in 1961.

Herald on Sunday

Geo-engineering techniques at a glance

John Kerr — Wed, 06 Apr 2011 04:01:19 +0000

When comes to engineering initiatives to fight climate change, what works, what doesn’t and how much will it cost?

Today’s Dominion Post carried an article reporting on the recent geo-engineering workshop run by the Royal Society. Accompanying the article was this Reuters infographic giving a concise yet informative over view of several geo-engineering projects.

Such projects could be used to combat climate change and were discussed at the workshop by leading NZ scientists such as NIWA’s Philip Boyd and Mike Harvey. You can read the whole article, ‘Dangers seen in tweaking the planet’ by Kiran Chug, here.