#cool science!

[heavymetalhexcode]

Hey. If any of y'all science nerds want cool facts poured into your ear holes, I HIGHLY recommend the podcast Ologies hosted by Alie Ward. It's a good time.

[oceanattic]

Things like this make me wish I was good at math. Physics is so beautiful. Poetic, even.

[amolecularmatter-blog]

I know this is a really stupid question and I'm an idiot and everything, but how do you (not you personally, so don't say "on the internet"!) obtain pictures like that t-cells one?

Not a stupid question at all! The most common method is scanning electron microscopy. Scanning electron microscopes are a type of electron microscope that, as far as I understand, will construct an image of a sample by scanning it with a beam of electrons in a special pattern, called the raster scan pattern. Raster scanning is a systematic process of covering an area progressively, one line at a time; although often a great deal faster, it's similar - in a very general sense - to how your gaze travels when you read lines of text like these!

Scanning electron microscopes will read signals that the sample produces after interacting with electrons in a systematic way, as governed by the raster pattern - a bit like building up a three-dimensional image of something from long, thin slices, or cross-sections. The signals contain information about the sample's surface topography, composition, and other properties such as electrical conductivity. An image is then generated from those signals.

The images are usually black and white - colour, like in my post about T cells, is added afterwards using Adobe Photoshop or similar.