Masterpieces In Agar. These Are Some Of The Most Beautiful Agar Art Pics From (and Inspired By) The annual

Kung fu nuns of Nepal.

Via Pinterest

October 31st 2000, Expedition 1 launches to the International Space Station starting 15 years of Continuous Human Presence in Space

via reddit

my math homework: using Lagrange multipliers, safety goggles, rubber gloves, a pair of tongs, and a maniacal laugh, determine that...

There is no branch of mathematics, however abstract, which may not some day be applied to phenomena of the real world.

Nikolai Lobachevsky (via curiosamathematica)

NIH to retire all research chimpanzees

Two years after retiring most of its research chimpanzees, the US National Institutes of Health (NIH) is ceasing its chimp programme altogether, Nature has learned.

In a 16 November e-mail to the agency’s administrators, NIH director Francis Collins announced that the 50 NIH-owned animals that remain available for research will be sent to sanctuaries. The agency will also develop a plan for phasing out NIH support for the remaining chimps that are supported by, but not owned by, the NIH.

“I think this is the natural next step of what has been a very thoughtful five-year process of trying to come to terms with the benefits and risks of trying to perform research with these very special animals,” Collins said in an interview with Nature. “We reached a point where in that five years the need for research has essentially shrunk to zero. “

The US National Institutes of Health once maintained a colony of roughly 350 research chimpanzees. Cyril Ruoso/Minden Pictures/Getty

Fabiola Gianotti

Particle physicist Fabiola Gianotti was born on October 29, 1960 in Rome, Italy. In 2014, it was announced that she will become CERN’s next Director-General beginning in 2016. As head of Atlas, one of CERN’s principle detector projects that discovered the Higgs-Boson particle, she oversaw a team of 3,000 scientists. She also serves on the Scientific Advisory Board of the UN Secretary General.

Happy birthday, Fabiola Gianotti!

photo: fabiola gianotti/origin symposium, claudia marcelloni

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What is human existence? It turns out it’s pretty simple: We are dead stars, looking back up at the sky.

Dr. Michelle Thaller, NASA astronomer  (via psych-facts)

Check out these scientists reacting to the first images from the Hubble Space Telescope after they successfully fixed its wonky mirror.

Then watch our music video celebrating Hubble here.

Then read all about Hubble’s 25 years in space here.