The Rare Purple Glory Butterfly
Prepona praeneste praeneste (female) Junin, Peru Hewitson, 1859 Little is known of this rare butterfly. This elusive type is found in the rainforests of Peru, and feeds on overripe fruit […]
Ancient Burmese Amber
Scorpionfly in Prehistoric Amber Myanmar (Burma) Mid-Cretaceous Period – ~100 MYA Amber is really old tree sap. It mainly comes from conifer trees, such as firs and pines that grew […]
A First for Sherlock Holmes
Sherlock Holmes – A Scandal in Bohemia Strand Magazine July, 1891 Sherlock Holmes is clearly the most famous detective in the world. This fictional character along with his assistant, Dr. […]
A Dinosaur Dilemma
Nanotyrannus Tooth Hell Creek Formation, North Dakota 70-65 MYA Determination of a new dinosaur species is not an exact science. Paleontologists and laboratory scientists base the species of a given […]
Zero from the Fathoms
Mitsubishi A6M3 Zero Tail Hook Rabaul Harbor, Papua New Guinea Mid-1943. The Mitsubishi A6M Zero-sen was Japan’s premier fighter in World War II. It was the best all round carrier […]
A Public Library on a Fingertip
400GB MicroSD Memory Card Motorola Solutions 2005~. The first small storage format for computer data was the 8-inch floppy disk, available commercially from Memorex in 1972. It was a flexible, […]
Collision with Mercury
Abee Enstatite Meteorite Alberta, Canada June 9, 1952. Meteorites are known to come from the Moon, the Planet Mars, and many likely from the Asteroid Belt between Mars and Jupiter. […]
Prehistoric Poop
Large Sauropod Coprolite Morrison Formation, Utah 156~147 MYA. Coprolites are the fossilized feces of dinosaurs that were able to remain intact for millions of years. Their existence has helped in […]
Salting the Earth with Life
Murchison Meteorite Murchison, Australia September 28, 1969. How did life appear on Earth? For life to begin and evolve, fundamental structures need to be present. Among these are amino acids […]
The Owl and the Autocrat
Athens Owl Tetradrachm Alexander the Great Tetradrachm Ancient Greece 449 B.C./330 B.C. As is the case today as it was in ancient times, trade brings growth to nations. A key […]