The mouse lemur is the smallest primate in the world, with a combined head, body, and tail length of less than 30cm (11.8"). It is native to Madagascar and is nocturnal. Mouse lemurs are considered cryptic species—with very little morphological differences between the various species, but with high genetic diversity.
Lemurs and mouse lemurs were announced by the IUCN as the most endangered of all vertebrates. There were 2 known mouse lemur species in 1992; by 2016, there were 24.
if you’ve been here for very long, you’ve probably noticed us making disdainful references to everythingfox! but why, you ask, do you guys dislike that blog so much?
everythingfox is a content aggregator. they repost videos without credit, often linking back to a reddit or imgur post that is itself a repost. often it takes me about five minutes to find the original source of a video, something they could also do if they really cared about sourcing videos properly! they do not.
they also uncritically post videos of animals in tons of situations that are unsafe or outright dangerous. they post wild animals being kept as pets in homes, interactions between predator and prey animals, interactions between humans and wild animals, staged videos that are borderline abuse, videos that actually are abuse, and sometimes adorable animals being adorable with no problems. lots of people are unable to pick the bad videos out from the good, which means they may be consuming content they don’t realize is actually harmful to animals.
now, it’s the internet, we all make mistakes and sometimes post something we didn’t realize was harmful. however, when harmful posts are pointed out, the person running the blog becomes defensive and doubles down. they do not take responsibility for the content they promote.
i genuinely believe it’s possible to run an ethical blog for posting cute animal content. it just takes effort. you have to credit your sources, use some critical skills when selecting videos/pictures, and be able to accept corrections. everythingfox’s creator does not seem at all interested in trying to abide by these tenets.
If it comes from one of the aggregate accounts (there are a few I’ve been repeatedly linked to, but everythingfox is the one most people know), it’s safer to assume it’s not cute, and be pleasantly surprised if it is, rather than the other way around.
Phototubes, shown here, emit electrons when exposed to light that produce electrical currents. This 1937 episode of GE’s “Excursions in Science” series came out just as manufacturers were beginning to take the device mainstream. The first commercial application was the reproduction of sound for motion picture films.
Atomic Force Microscopy, or AFM, is a technique by which a small mechanical probe is scanned across a sample to create a height map. This technique has very high resolution, less than a nanometer, depending on what kind of tip is being used, and can be done in ambient conditions (no need for vacuum). AFM is useful for getting roughness data and measuring film thickness, and can be combined with other microscopy techniques to get a complete picture of your device.
AFM probes often get damaged or dirty, resulting in “tip graveyards” like the one shown here.
Plasma is the fourth state of matter (in addition to solids, liquids, and gases) that can be best described as an ionized gas. It is a high energy state, in which there is sufficient energy to strip electrons from atoms or molecules in a gas. The plasma glows because when the electrons recombine with atoms, energy is released in the form of light. The color of the light depends on the composition of the plasma. The plasma in this picture is purple mainly because of the argon ions used to bombard the platinum.
Surprisingly, even though plasma is probably one of the least known of the states of matter, it is the most common in the universe. Examples of plasmas encountered in nature include lightning, some types of flames, nebulae, and stars.
