Aperture news, articles and features | Page 2

Physics

These striking photos are a window into the world of quantum physics

David Severn has taken a series of images of scientists working on quantum physics for King’s College London’s new Quantum Untangled exhibition

Regulars

Maths Village - Piero Castellano Sirince (Izmir, Turkey)

Mathematics

These images explore a 'utopic' village built for teaching maths

Regulars

Marsh deer crosses the Transpantanal roadway amid thick smoke from the forest fire.

Environment

See how fire has changed the world's largest wetland, the Pantanal

Regulars

Humans

Ancient rock art revealed in all its glory in stunning photographs

Regulars

$PAGE 20 MOMENT A while ago, I borrowed a piece of opal from a geological museum to photograph for a book I was working on. Using my ?real? camera, I had to figure out a good composition for a picture of this complicated mineral. Notice the larger light-blue ?veins? running across the image. I used them as organizational elements, to create sections to help the viewer decide how to look at the image. PHENOMENON Over many years of geological time, opal is slowly formed as many small spheres of silica (what glass is made of) self-assemble into perfectly ordered layers. Diffraction (not to be confused with refraction) occurs when light passes through the spheres and gaps, and it is split into the colors of the visible spectrum: red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, and violet. The diameter of the spheres and the spacing between them determines the colors that we see. Light reflected from the different stacked layers creates interference effects.$