Science Mystery Pix
★ Art or Nature?: This beautiful image reminds me of the art of Van Gogh: Willows at Sunset (http://goo.gl/E0rYPo), perhaps? But it’s actually a photomicrograph of an insect part. Can you guess what it may be? Hint: it’s useful during aquatic sex 🙂
★ Rheinberg Illumination: This image was colorized using a form of microscopy invented in 1896 by Julius Rheinberg. Quite simply, a two colored filter, usually cut from sheets of acetate, is placed in front of the light source. One color makes up the background while the other is diffracted by the object under study. It’s a cheap and creative way to bring art into science! A nice explanation can be found here: http://www.cellsalive.com/enhance1.htm
Photo credit: Spike Walker / Wellcome Images
#ScienceEveryday #ISeeTheWorldWithScience
madame scientist's not-so-mad musings 
Like this explanation of what makes sense in scientific study and color visualization.
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BJ Bolender as a photographer, have you experimented with colored filters? I guess they are only used in microscopes?
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Well, I am slowly getting up the nerve to experiment with ND filters, Neutral Density, which cut the severe and sharp contrasts of light and shadow. But I am intrigued by the use of colored filters as the colored gel leaves one holds in front of the lens. Most of my play in color would be from use of photo editing. I wonder how helpful expertise in photo editing software could be for scientific photography? After all, one can select colors to drop out or replace with the software.
Very interesting Rajini Rao! I had not heard of this technique. I use Schlerien photography to image slight changes in refractive index. This should work for changes in absorbance. Will try!
There is a lot of sophisticated photo editing and use of false color in scientific photography, although there are strict ground rules and ethics to follow so that the effect is only for visualization.
BTW, since a camera can “see” far more colors than a human eye, I often find I work hard in Photoshop to bring the full frame images more in line with what my human eyes see and remember. I would have to think that photographic research would have a side branch specifically devoted to uses in photography to benefit the study at hand. There could be development of camera sensors and technology targeted only for such intensively micro and macroscopic images.
Bill Carter , I had to look this up 🙂
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schlieren_photography
BJ Bolender , indeed there are dedicated Imaging Centers and Microscopy Cores at research institutions with quite an array of technology (2 photon microscope, confocal laser scanning microscopes, etc) with dedicated technical personnel who help us with both the software, quantification and the image acquisition.
Great stuff, Rajini Rao , my friend.
Art imitates life imitates Art :-}
I’m interested in the ethics issues of such scientific photography. Surely there is a place for enhanced software and scientific visualization that includes specifically what a human eye cannot “see”. And I think it must go beyond just “power” and the degree of magnification.
What I imagine is like the software visualizations that can translate color into sound. I heard a great story on NPR last night about an astronomer who studies dying stars and is researching image translation to sound. There were symphonies and specific peaks and chorus sounds with each data point!
BJ Bolender , ethics training in image handling is crucial in science! I know of people who have lost their jobs, had their papers retracted and banned from federal funding because of improper image manipulation. For example, the image has to be manipulated as a whole and one cannot selectively choose a particular part to enhance or lighten.
Love the idea of matching images to sounds! I remember a post on the sounds picked up in outer space..let me see if I can find it. I’ll check out the NPR story, thanks.
You may enjoy these space sounds, BJ Bolender :
https://plus.google.com/u/0/+YonatanZunger/posts/D5cz526My9B
John Kampsen I knew you would appreciate this, and what an apt caption!
Rajini Rao only because I’m “Scientific American” subscriber and photography lover ( I do it 44 years) I know what it is. Photo won some award 5 or so years ago.. I was so suprised by what it was that I still remember. 🙂
Clue: part of a water beetle.
The Rheinberg illumination is a method which has revolutionized microbibiology.
Leszek Dziędziewicki , that’s how I found it too. From there, I learned a lot about “gas gills” which are fascinating structures that allow this water beetle to be submerged for a long time. If only I can find a nice image of this “plastron”, I will write up a post on it.
My view on the ethics of image processing is that all is fair game – but your procedures must be documented for peer review. No different that using any other reductive analysis tool (NMR, FTIR, etc.) – if another scientist can’t repeat your work, then it is suspect. And if you can’t get confirmatory results via a different measurement technique, then it is suspect.
False colour is a great way to visually differentiate finely detailed structure in lots of areas including such diverse things as brain scans and cosmic microwave background detection. There is a reason why our visual systems have evolved to make specific use of certain perceived colours.
Brent Neal , good points about documentation and reproducibility. Hopefully, the image/data don’t need much processing to make one’s point. False colors are a good example of a legitimate use, Jim Donegan . The problems arise when one manipulates one part of the image relative to the other. Sadly, I’m on an ethical committee investigating a case of improper image manipulation right now. It’s a pain for everyone concerned.
Using the same palette shouldn’t cause jubilation. Using Photoshop, you use what they call “color channels” to manipulate a palette. You can then borrow a CLUT from another image and put it in a suitable target.
Rajini Rao – The issue is that at times you do have to process some parts of the image relative to others. For example, in the cases of segmentation, to do greyscale/binary morphological operations in order to correctly measure the aggregate feature area, or in the cases of densitometry, to measure pixel values in the appropriate regions of the image, rather than globally across the whole image (which would bias or invalidate your results.)
While I agree that the best image processing is the least necessary to do the appropriate measurement (and that the best place to do your image processing is during sample prep,) your images aren’t going to measure themselves and you shouldn’t throw away data arbitrarily.
Brent Neal measuring pixels or some feature is fine. I was referring to enhancing or masking one part of an image relative to the others to falsify the results. For example, we separate out bands of protein and quantify them in response to a particular experimental condition. If all the bands are cranked up or down in intensity that is okay, but one cannot partially brighten one set of them without doing the same for the rest. This is the most common form of fraud in molecular biology.
Rajini Rao – I’m sorry, I must not have been very clear. I was writing in a hurry. Of course measurement is fine, because it doesn’t alter the image. But the point is that in order to make good measurements, you often have to process the image in non-uniform ways.
Again, if your author had made the original images available and the procedures by which he/she had processed them, any fraud would be easy to catch. What you describe is nothing different that the “peak scrubbing” incidents that we’ve seen on the chemistry side with NMR spectra.
Interesting, Brent Neal ! I’ll have to
teasequiz my friends in the NMR field about this “peak scrubbing” 🙂ChemBark had a great post on it back last summer.
It is human nature to make art; therefore, art is nature.
I cannot guess, however I can marvel at the beauty of it. I thought for a moment I was in a cathedral. Then I thought I was staring into the eye of something greater than I was. Finally I settled upon being in a museum, looking at a grand painting upon the wall.
Fascinating image. Thank you Rajini Rao
The image shows the suckers on the front leg of the male diving beetle. Dytiscus marginalis, commonly known as the great diving beetle. At the top right is part of a large sucker and on the left are five rows of smaller ones. Diving beetles spend most of their time, and mate, under water.
Source: http://www.cellimagelibrary.org/images/38808
Image manipulation in astronomy is a big deal too, because so many of the relevant colors are outside of the visible spectrum. One approach often used is “shift” the colors into the visible, which makes for some very striking images.
I think this is one reason astronomy pictures have become so popular.
Jonah Miller – it’s the equivalent of false coloring in microscope images.
For those who were wondering about BJ Bolender ‘s reference to the NPR story on “hearing” the spectrum from stars, here is Jonah’s post on it: https://plus.google.com/u/0/+JonahMiller/posts/5tps2qavQ2t
Oops! Yes, that makes sense! Thanks for the correction. 🙂
It wasn’t a correction! Just drawing parallels between different fields 🙂
Is the answer yes?
Crystalline Reynolds , it’s yes to both (art and nature) 🙂
Nature is art, and this is a prime example! 🙂
Whichever, it’s beautiful.
Yes, very 🙂
Hi Rajini, a very beautiful art! I wish you a very Happy New Year!
Art is Nature an Nature is a Miracle and a blessing.
super
Agreed!
Very informative! Thanks Rajini Rao , as always!
Stuti S A I , the answer is buried up in the comments, so in case you missed it, these are suckers on the legs of the male diving beetle, used to keep the female from getting away 🙂
Yes, I read it 🙂 Very unfair and male-chauvinistic on the part of these male insects!
Perhaps females don’t need special devices to hang on to their mates? 🙂
Ha! Ha! Ha! I doff my hat to science and Almighty’s intersection at creativity in the natural space.
Rajini Rao Black Widows and Mantis do, but it is for devouring the mate. Another lethal case of Queen checkmate 🙂
Ahh, so such devices in females can have deadly consequences. Better not arm the female with more ammunition than necessary 🙂
Nature’s balancing acts
This is really excellent Art.
so like
They (females) control the desires from being shared by devouring after completing the required task. I am not sure if it’s a nature’s built in protection.
It’s is an artistic show of human male cells attacking the egg (female)
I would never have guessed even with the clues! Thanks for sharing Rajini Rao
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Really beautiful… even inspiring 🙂
Rajini Rao As I say, the female is the center of the universe. My own studies show that all atomic and subatomic particle is XX 😉
mic sor I am pleased to concur 😉
This is not my area but i am fascinated. I apologize for the totally ignorant question but i am interested to know if the shapes as shown in this pic are a balanced pattern of like repeating shapes (composing the plastron) and sizes. Or might you suggest a reference for me to read more? Thank you
Karen Katz , I think you are asking if these sorts of structures are fractal, i.e., made up of similar structures on different scales? Biology is full of repeating patterns, in this case we are seeing both large and small suckers at the microscopic level. I plan to write a post on plastrons in a couple of days..I’ll talk about large and small structures that keep water from entering the air canals of insects so they continue to breathe under water. I can tag you on that post if you want. Thanks for your interest!
Yes please do. Thank you!
Jeni Ong , wow, yes!! Even better fit than Van Gogh.
i love art.its great
Great art… Reminds me many things..
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World is a monster
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Good flares like
Waoo nice… u look really a genius i like it…
THANK YOU FOR BRINGING US INTRICATELY BEAUTIFUL AND INTERESTING POSTS !
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