Two vertical fibers, with a gap left between them, form a playground for flow in this Gallery of Fluid Motion video. If the fiber spacing is small enough, the flow Keep reading
Month: March 2025
Escaping the Sun
One enduring mystery of the solar wind — a stream of high-energy particles expelled from the sun — is how the particles get accelerated in the first place. The sun Keep reading
Recreating the Rings of Power Opening
Everyone loves a good title sequence, especially when they feature neat visuals. Many who watched “The Rings of Power” zeroed in immediately on their use of cymatics — visuals born Keep reading
“Crystallizing Epsom Salts”
Candy-colored crystals emerge from a salty liquid in this macro video of Epsom salt crystallization by Karl Gaff. The video was an honorable mention in the 2022 edition of the Keep reading
Testing Full-Size Engines
Engineers can often use small-scale models to test the physics of their creations, but sometimes there’s no substitute for going large. In this photo, we see a full-size commercial engine Keep reading
Moths and Beetles in Flight
Watching insects take flight in high-speed video is always mesmerizing. So often their wings look too small and fragile to lift their bulbous bodies, but they manage the feat easily. Keep reading
Droplet Bounce
A droplet falling on a liquid bath may, if slow enough, rebound off the surface. Its impact sends out a string of ripples — capillary waves — on the bath’s Keep reading
Chemical Flowers
These “flowers” blossom as two injected chemicals react in the narrow space between two transparent plates. The chemical reaction produces a darker ring that develops a streaky outer edge due Keep reading
The Delta Series
It’s easy in the rush of our daily lives to forget just how dynamic rivers are. In his “Delta Series” conservation photographer Paul Nicklen explores that ever-changing nature from above Keep reading
Turbulence in Accretion Disks
Accretion disks form everywhere, from around young, planet-building stars to massive black holes. As matter circles in the disk, it slowly loses angular momentum and falls inward toward the central Keep reading