Mapping Scientific Excellence - ranking the world’s best scientific organisations

Introducing Mapping Scientific Excellence - a new, interactive web app/map which ranks scientific institutions around the world based on citations (more on that shortly). The app was designed by Lutz Bornmann and colleagues at Germany’s Max Planck Society, and looks at institutions around the world, ranking them in 17 subject areas and according to according […]

If Ptolemy had been right, and the magical theory of relativity

Two excellent pieces of visual science communication today. The first is a visualisation of what our solar system would look like it Ptolemy had been right. As you no doubt remember, he’s the chap who posited that the _earth_ was the centre of, well, everything. Sadly I can’t embed it here, but go and check […]

Graphic: Magnitude 5+ earthquakes this year (in NZ)

UPDATE: See bottom of post for updated graphic, as of 26 July 2013 I’ve just made my first ever data visualisation :) Spurred by this morning’s nasty bump near Wellington, and because I love me the learning of the new skills, I’ve made the graphic below. Using data I sucked down from geonet, it shows […]

Software Carpentry Bootcamp - a delicious name for a delicious thing

Friends! Readers! Random people who ended up here alone and confused! As hopefully all of you* know by now, the 2013 eResearch Symposium is next week in Christchurch.  Started in 2010, this illustrious and awesome event is all about the burgeoning field, of, well, eResearch. Which is still in the process, in many ways, of […]

Here is today

One of the many uses of my inbox is for me to email to myself things to blog, share, write about and read. Of course, this means I have a great many unacted-upon notes in my inbox, but c’est la vie*. However, my eyes lit upon this interactive exploration of time (emailed to myself a […]

Fantastic data vis of US language differences

As with all countries, large OR small, there are going to be variations in dialect and pronunciation. Given its size and history, one would expect the US to have some pretty fantastic ones. And it does! PhD (Statistics) student Joshua Katz hasjust published a fantastic set of data visualisations from a linguistic survey of how […]

How did feathers evolve?

No doubt you all know by now that fellow Sciblogger and all-around awesomesauce person Siouxsie Wiles has started making some wonderful science videos. If you’ve not already seen and loved them, you can catch them on her YouTube channel - we look forward to the next ones, Siouxsie! And so, in that vein, I thought […]

Marvellous MRI music vid

Hooray for CNET!  not only do I use them whenever I’m looking at new tech to buy, but they’ve also pointed me at an extraordinary music video. British musician Sivu (James Page) spent 2-3 hours holed up in an MRI machine at St. Bartholomew’s Hospital in London for his new single, ‘Better Man Than He’. […]

Competition for Wellington infographics makers

This post is aimed at those of you who make infographics, or are interested in them, or know someone who does/is. Think of it as a spreading of the word… On Feb 16th, Contribeauty (‘turning data into design’) and Pledgeme.co.nz (NZ’s own version of Kickstartr) are going to be holding an infographics competition. The second […]

Google+ rolls out Google Communities

Well, earlier today (depending on where you are, of course), Google+ started rolling out Google Communities. The service is brand new, so I don’t have much of an opinion about it yet.  I’ve just joined a makers/hackers/engineers/artists community, as these are things I think are cool and I reckon it’ll be a really interesting example […]