Today we have here some pretty things to share, and all thanks to a contest Research as Art from the University of Swansea (UK). The jury was composed by members from the Royal Academy of Arts, from the Royal Institution, from the magazine New Scientist and the Research Councils UK.And the winner was…

This year’s winner, material’s engineer Laura North got the prize with this comic strip that depicts the process to replicate the toy from a Kinder Surprise using non destructive techniques with which to produce new prototypes fast. She explains that each step represents her daily routine in the lab and it is made to replicate an idea for an experiment planned on Easter (yes indeed, scientists can work on holidays).

Even when it might seem stupid trying to replicate the toy without breaking the egg has many and important applications in real life like trying to replicate momified snake rests or perfectly matching protheses. Also, and these are my words, it is an awesome way of representing it.

More stuff: in this one what’s important is not what you can see but what remains hidden. Under the surface of that apparently calm sea there’s an important energy source, the author of the picture, Alice Hicks, explains: liters and liters of moving waters. Under these waters there’s a 2.2MW turbine to take advantage of the strength of tidal waves. And Alice’s work has to do with the interaction between those turbines and the other inhabitants of those waters:  porpoises and seals.

And another one. A harsher one. Like a devastated landscape. Like the surface of some dark planet, so it appears the surface of this newly developed material to the eye of an electronic microscope as shown by Dr. James Sullivan.This material made out of small geometrically shaped cristals can generate electricity when exposed to a temperature gradient, therefore it is possible to use this material to build spacecrafts. Cool, right?

Time to finish but I’ll do it the same way I usually do, by encouraging you all to visit the home page of the contest and enjoy the rest of the images submitted to it. Enjoy!