Saturday 13 February 2016

Tree of life

I first came across this image last October and I cannot now remember how I got to it. All I can recover - from gmail search - is the fact that it was something to do with Duke University in North Carolina, a place which calls itself a private research university. See reference 1. I remember that at the time I thought what a pity it was that no-one had animated the thing. I also thought that I had posted it, but diligent searching has failed to turn anything up.

But now, in Scientific American, a famous magazine with which I renewing my acquaintance, I find that someone has done something of the sort and I am fairly sure that the someone is from the same lot as before.

The tree at reference 2 is a bit techy and I have not yet even learned how to drive the wheel at reference 3, but I shall get there. Maybe I will work out how to get back to the image above, an inferior version of that now shown in Scientific American. But further investigation there is suspended until their web site catches up with their post: I am holding a March issue but the web site only seems to go as far as February.

You would be right in thinking that I rather like trees of life and have several books about such things, the best being that by LeCointre & Le Guyader.

PS: I might add that the Scientific American is a lot smaller than I remember it, although the pictures and content are still good: I dare say they are struggling, along with the rest of the print world, against freebies on the internet. There is also a suspicion that some old news is being recycled as new - with this tree of life being one of the two such stories that I have come across.

Reference 1: https://today.duke.edu/2015/09/treeoflife.

Reference 2: http://opentreeoflife.org/.

Reference 3: http://etreeoflife.com/wheel/.

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