Mapping Ice - Arctic and Antarctic Ice Depths

Recently the European Space Agency posted imagery of sea-ice thickness from ESA’s CryoSat mission to both poles of the earth. Here is a link to a nice time series image of ice loss over three decades: http://www.esa.int/SPECIALS/Cryosat/SEMQK4908BE_1.html 

From their site:
" ...CryoSat measures the height of the sea ice above the water line, known as the freeboard, to calculate the thickness. The measurements used to generate this first map of the Arctic were from January and February 2011, as the ice approaches its annual maximum.."

"... For the first time, data from ESA’s CryoSat mission have been used

to map the height of the ice sheet that blankets Antarctica. The preliminary data used here are from February and March 2011... CryoSat's ability to map the edges of the ice sheet is demonstrated by the detail that can be seen of the flow from east Antarctica onto the Ronne-Filchner ice shelf in the west. ... [t]he outer white circle represents the limits of earlier missions and the inner circle shows that CryoSat is collecting data up 88° latitude..."

Full credit to the Map Room for bringing this to my attention.

Anthropomorphic and zoomorphic maps - When Depictions of Life intersects Location

Neat blog post on Anthropomorphic and zoomorphic maps. Credits to The Map Room and Donna Seger's The Streets of Salem of bringing this to my attention.


From her post " ... The shift from conceptual to more realistic cartography in the early modern era is a very evident and important trend, but early modern mapmakers retained a bit of whimsy when they produced maps in the form of plants, animals and humans in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries...."

 German theology professor Heinrich Bunting’s Travels according to the Scriptures (1581): 

Specific to this image, " ...Another lively early modern map is the “Dutch Lion” map (Leo Belgicus, Leo Hollandicus ) issued in a succession of variations from the late sixteenth century, contemporaneously with the Dutch Revolt against Spain. The rebellious Dutch provinces are shown in the form of a lion, roaring in the face of the powerful Spanish Empire...."

"Leo Hollandicus", JC Visscher, 1648

Chicago in 3-D

Mapping Oil Production - More Crude than you think

Found this via the Map Room with credits to Market Place (research by Adam Popescu).

Quick Cut & Paste:
" .... On the one-year anniversary of the BP Oil Spill in the Gulf of Mexico, we take a look at the future of crude as we enter an era of "tough oil." This interactive map - and our coverage below - examines how world crude oil production has shifted over the years, particularly from 1960 to 2010, as oil producers search for new locations and methods for extracting oil...."

Full article & interactive map - click here.

Mapping your LinkedIn Network

Neat way to understand your porfessional "spheres of connection".
From LinkedIn Labs  - InMaps - Visualize your LinkedIn network.

Mapping Android Usage - Activations by Continent

Interesting given all the recent press around "Apple-nation" - never count "the 'Droid" out.
Still no GSM for Apple iPhone on Verizon (aarrgghh).
Credits to FlowingData for bringing this to my attention.

Mapping Units of Measure -Size is relative in the Universe

Size is "relative" in the universe.



From the NASA APOD Project:
Star Size Comparisons



Credit & Copyright: morn1415 (YouTube)


Explanation: How big is our Sun compared to other stars? In a dramatic and popular video featured on YouTube, the relative sizes of planets and stars are shown from smallest to largest. The above video starts with Earth's Moon and progresses through increasingly larger planets in our Solar System. Next, the Sun is shown along as compared to many of the brighter stars in our neighborhood of the Milky Way Galaxy. Finally, some of the largest stars known spin into view. Note that the true sizes of most stars outside of the Sun and Betelgeuse are not known by direct observation, but rather inferred by measurements of their perceived brightness, temperature, and distance. Although an inspiring learning tool that is mostly accurate, APOD readers are encouraged to complete the learning experience -- and possibly help make future versions more accurate -- by pointing out slight inaccuracies in the video.

Mapping the International Space Station (ISS): A timeline visualization of construction

This is a nice timeline visualization from USA Today on the "evolution of construction" for the International Space Station (ISS) - beginning in 1998 thru 2010.

USA Today ISS timeline

The Alteryx Grand Prix - a video at Las Vegas Speedway

Astronomical Calculations of Eclipses & Celestial Events ... with Legos

OK. I just made fortresses and spaceships as a kid with legos .... brilliant example of human ingenuity, both 2,000+ years ago and today. 



Some quick excerpts from the Scientific American interview:
" How long did it take to make the device and video?



Andy built the device from scratch in about 30 days. Preproduction took forever—most of the spring and summer. We filmed in Portland for a week in September, then I went back to New York and directed the animators' stop-motion work via daily phone calls and email/video updates for about a month and a half. Postproduction took a few weeks all told. But from very beginning to very end, it took us all of 2010.






So this Lego-built mechanism really works to predict the next solar eclipse?


Absolutely. It predicts solar and lunar eclipses to the exact year, date, and time of day accurate to within two hours, out to about a century or two in the future. Beyond that, mechanical effects like flexion and friction cause drift in the calculations done by the gears, but it is still accurate to the day, if not the exact time. "


Full article  - click here
 
References:
For more, check out Pavlus' behind-the-scenes blog.



Find additional details on the antikythera in Tony Freeth's Scientific American article "Decoding an Ancient Computer," which also appears in "The Best American Science Writing 2010".