Recent Videos

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  Collecting the World: Inside the Smithsonian – Great Big Story (2017)

  January 2, 2018 at 7:46 pm / Evolution, Natural history, Video

  The Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History (NMHM) in Washington D.C. was visited by more than 7.1 million people in year 2016. The museums rich collection has over 144 million different artifacts. Only a very small fraction (less than 1 percent) of these collections are on display to the public. The bottom of the iceberg, the 99 percent of the Smithsonian’s treasures remain behind the scenes. Scientists and curators work with these objects to study and understand the world we […]

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  What is the Tragedy of the Commons? – Nicholas Amendolare | TED-Ed (2017)

  January 1, 2018 at 8:46 pm / Ecological Documentaries, Human Nature, Video

  The tragedy of the commons is an economic hypothesis popularized in 1968 by ecologist Garrett Hardin. The concept was examined in a 1987 BBC documentary called “Nice Guys Finish First” by Richard Dawkins with a game theoretical framework. The Tragedy of the Commons predicts ecological degradation due to human conflict of self-interest over the long-term well-being of their community. There are many examples of common resource exploitation such as destruction of cashew trees in Mozambic. However, this theory was heavily […]

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  Kīlauea Summit Eruption | Lava Returns to Halemaʻumaʻu – USGS (2017)

  January 1, 2018 at 12:18 pm / Global Patterns, Video

  The sight of liquid molten rock is a stunning experience and has inspired many filmmakers to capture it. The Greek geographer Strabo provides the first historical and technical account of a lava field from a belt of extinct volcanoes in Turkey. This area is now declared as a UNESCO World Heritage Site. In March 2008, a new volcanic vent opened within Halema‘uma‘u, a crater at the summit of Kīlauea Volcano in Hawaiʻi Volcanoes National Park on the Island of Hawaiʻi. […]

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  The Lava Affair – SKUNK BEAR/NPR (2015)

  December 31, 2017 at 10:34 pm / Global Patterns, Video

  Continents float on a massive ocean of magma and lava is what we observe when it reaches to the surface. The first technical description of lava flow comes from the Greek geographer Strabo in his book. He describes the Katakekaumene, which means the “burnt country” referring to a region of around 1,800 km2 in western Anatolia. The region harbors a dormant volcanic belt within the town of Kula which has been declared as a UNESCO World Heritage Site. The volcanism […]

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  The Lichenologist – Matthew Killip (2017)

  November 28, 2017 at 7:56 pm / Ecological Documentaries, Evolution, Natural history, Video

  This is the second installment from the filmmaker Matthew Killip following the “-omist/ogist” theme. Evolution of cooperation is a curious subject for biologists. The evolution of cooperation is investigated within the framework of game theory and has been encapsulated in a 1987 BBC documentary called “Nice Guys Finish First” by Richard Dawkins. How do organisms belonging to different kingdoms coordinate to live together? What are the rules of symbiosis? Lichens provide this type of study system where algae and fungi […]

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  The Anomalies: Acorn Woodpecker – Nate Dappen & Neil Losin (2017)

  November 28, 2017 at 11:48 am / Ecological Documentaries, Evolution, Natural history, Wildlife Documentaries

  Acorn Woodpeckers (Melanerpes formicivorus) are quite distinctive from other woodpecker species: They are communal. How did the cooperative behavior evolve? Biologists are working on answers for this curious question. Evolution of cooperative behavior is a matter of game theory and has been encapsulated in a 1987 BBC documentary called “Nice Guys Finish First” by Richard Dawkins. One of the most ubiquitous example for cooperative behavior comes from ants. Why do certain individuals altruistically give up their reproduction and help others? […]

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  Cave of Forgotten Dreams – Werner Herzog (2010)

  November 23, 2017 at 8:02 pm / Human Nature, Video

  Since its discovery in 1994 it was quickly realized that the Chauvet Cave of France harbors one of the most impressive art ever been studied belonging to Aurignacian. The Werner Herzog documentary articulates the findings in his characteristic story telling style. Archeologists had a bitter experience in opening such caves to public. The Lascaux cave paintings have been sadly damaged beyond repair due to increased humidity from visitors breath. Happily we can take a virtual tour of the Chauvet cave […]

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  Ice Age Art – Arrival of the Modern Mind

  November 23, 2017 at 4:28 pm / Evolution, Human Nature, Video

  Starting from the middle paleolithic going back to 100 thousand years Human intellect shows strong signs of complex behavior. Cognitive capacity were in place to track seasons, animal movements and resources spatially distributed over large areas. Here you will find a concatenation of short clips compiled from scholarly resources such as the Nature Magazine, the British Museum, the Khan Academy, the Economist and the National Geographic all featuring great examples of art within the last 40,000 years. These include the […]

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  Gene Silencing by MicroRNAs – Katharina Petsche (2015)

  November 21, 2017 at 8:25 am / Evolution, Molecular Nature, Video

  Welcome to another post of Molecular Nature series highlighting a gene silencing mechanism known as RNA interference. The animation was produced by Katharina Petsche. The discovery was made by Craig Mello and Andrew Fire who shared 2006 Nobel Prize in Physiology and Medicine. Please keep in mind that this video is quite advanced in content and assumes the viewers know about basic molecular biological concepts such as the Central Dogma of Biology. RNA interference (RNAi) is a process used by […]

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  Chain Forming Leptogenys Ants from Cambodia – Stephane de Greef (2014)

  November 15, 2017 at 10:00 pm / Ecological Documentaries, Natural history, Short Observations, Video, Wildlife Documentaries

  The ant behavior described in these observations were first recorded by citizen scientists in Cambodia (see the original recording at the end of this post) where ants have been shown to form chains to transport large prey. The level of cooperation is so striking that myrmecologists scrambled to find out whether it is genuine. Two researchers have successfully documented the behavior by filming them in Angkor Thom, Siem Reap, Cambodia. Self-assembling cooperation in ants is known to take many interesting […]

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  48 Cantones: The Mayan Forest – Thomas & Julian Moll-Rocek (2014)

  November 10, 2017 at 8:11 pm / Human Nature, Video

  In their documentary, Thomas & Julian Moll-Rocek explore the Mayan Cosmovision. For Meso-Americans this is a worldview that integrates the structure of space and rhythms of time into a unified whole. In Guatemala’s western mountains, in the state of Totonicapán, a large community forest has prospered for centuries adjacent to densely populated valleys. The Mayan forest cover the hills and the mountain ridge. The management of local resources by the Mayan community provides a counter-argument for the ‘tragedy of the […]

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  Development of a Salamander Embryo – Yale University Department of Anatomy (1920s)

  November 10, 2017 at 4:08 pm / Evolution, Molecular Nature, Technical Notes, Video

  Everyone of us started life from one single cell formed by the fusion of an egg and a sperm. That single cell gave rise to every structure in our bodies. How did that happen? Salamanders are known to be able to regenerate limbs while frogs and lizards cannot. How and why? The time lapsed footage of salamander embryos developing from single fertilized eggs forms the basis of our morphological understanding of animal development. The footage recorded by Yale University researchers […]

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  Dingo of the Australia – Adam Geiger (2013)

  October 30, 2017 at 12:35 pm / Ecological Documentaries, Evolution, Natural history, Video, Wildlife Documentaries

  Dingo (Canis lupus dingo) appears in the archaeological record of Australia at 4230 years before present. They ruled the continent as apex predators together with the now extinct Tasmanian tiger within the last few thousand years. Dingoes successfully colonized the continent spreading into diverse habitats including tropical rainforests, temperate Eucalyptus forests, mountainous highlands and grasslands. The only exception is the dry inhospitable central deserts. Dog domestication is the earliest among other animals going back to 40,000 years ago. The Dingo […]

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  Run Hide be Invisible – Revealing the Leopard – PBS/NATURE (2010)

  October 22, 2017 at 12:16 am / Natural history, PBS Nature, Video, Wildlife Documentaries

  The Leopard (Felis pardus Linnaeus, 1758) is one of the most successful big cats of our time. It’s ability to adapt to different climates and habitats enabled spreading out of Africa into Asia. They live in diverse habitats such as forests, subtropical and tropical savannas, grasslands, rocky and mountainous regions, and even deserts. The leopard can live in both warm and cold climates. It has a very broad food base ranging from insects to large mammals. In Africa this cat […]

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  How mountaintop mining affects life and landscape in West Virginia – PBS (2017)

  September 15, 2017 at 11:15 pm / Ecological Documentaries, Global Patterns, Video

  Coal has been one of the work horses of power generation but its dominance is dwindling. In 2016 U.S. coal energy industry employed around 160,000 workers while solar energy production employed around 370,000. Coal has been a massive contributor to the accumulation of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere leading to mercury pollution with subsequent biomagnification throughout the food chain, ocean acidification and global warming. Some geologists propose that fossil fuel use including coal may be accepted as an indicator for […]

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