Sugar Atoms
TALK x HISTORY x THEME x quotes x one

False-colour SEM of a group of human chromosomes
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Covalent bonds operate within molecules. They hold atoms together, and are formed when atoms share valence electrons. The bonds arise from electrostatic attraction. They are strong bonds and a lot of energy is required to break them. The energy to break one mole of bonds between 2 covalently bonded non-metal atoms is called bond enthalpy. It ranges between 300 and 1000 kJmol^-1. 
Secondary interactions occur between neighbouring molecules and hold substances in liquid and solid state. Molar heat of vapourisation provides a measure of strength of the secondary interactions. They generally range between 0.4 and 50kJmol^-1. boiling moints share a correlation with the strength of the interactions. 
Argus Pheasant Feathers
Photograph by Tim Laman, National Geographic
Found in Southeast Asia, the male great argus pheasant (Argusianus argus)displays these dots on its feathers during courtship. Its plumage radiates around its head, like a peacock’s. Beyond attracting a mate, feathers are used for insulation, flight, and, in some cases, to help a bird hunt and evade predators.
Star Coral
Photograph by Heather Perry
Star coral (Montastrea cavernosa) polyps open in search of food near Little Cayman Island.
image credit: Murray Spence
AUSTRALIA’S MOST IMPORTANT WETLANDS for waterbirds have been identified by University of NSW researchers, following extensive aerial surveys.
The survey found that few wetlands supported large numbers of waterbirds (more than 10,000) - half of all waterbird species were found in just 1.1% of the wetlands surveyed; and that the top 20 wetlands held about 40 per cent of all waterbirds.Four of the five most important wetlands are in north-west Western Australia: Eighty Mile Beach, lakes Gregory and Argyle, and Roebuck Bay.
The Timor Sea has the highest concentration of drainage wetlands, followed by the south-west coast, the report found. Lake Eyre Basin was found to cover the largest area for wetlands.
Wetlands with extremely high concentrations of waterbirds (between 30,000 and 300,000) were found in northern Australia, Western Australia, central Queensland and western NSW.
heythereuniverse:

Amaranthaceae Pollen.
magnified-world:

Synthetic knit textile at 10x magnification.  6th place in the 1992 Nikon Small World Competition.
THE WORLD’S PLANT SPECIES will be collated in one database in a project that can be described as no easy feat.
Four of the world’s leading botanical institutions are compiling a catalogue of every plant on the globe - at least 400,000 species - to be made available online by 2020.  The St Louis-based Missouri Botanical Garden and New York Botanical Garden in the United States have joined forces with the Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh and the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew in the United Kingdom to produce the World Flora catalogue.
(via baneful, absolutefucker)
We are titration queens, just so you know. Phenolphthalein ftw guys. You should see the multiple high fives that occur when our titres are concordant. And the sqeals, golly. And after we finish we poir a whole heap of indictor in the flask and take pictures of the pretty colours. Because colours = not hating chem as much. And also, my chem teacher once awarded me the lab coat award (there are only 2 proper lab coats in the lab) for being awesome (i offered to go get paper towel to refill the dispenser okay).