(±0.2 Billion Years.)

Hello and welcome to my blog about my life (science) and whatever else takes my fancy (hint: it's more science). You may call me Dougal and I'm 19 Earth years old, currently double majoring in physics and chemistry in New Zealand. In reality I have no idea what I'm doing or what I'm going to do though so you'll find a little bit of everything.

14-billion-years-later:

I’ve never really been asked “what is your favorite shape?” but when someone finally does I am sure as hell going to have the most awesome reply: this thing. This thing is in fact known as an umbilic torus and it totally one ups the good old Möbius strip. First off a regular torus for those of you who don’t know is basically a donut shape, but the umbilic torus is a hell of a lot more interesting. The thing that’s really cool about it is that like the Möbius strip it really only has one side. If you start at one point and move along the side you will eventually get back to the starting point after “going around” the torus three times. — 14-billion-years-later:

I’ve never really been asked “what is your favorite shape?” but when someone finally does I am sure as hell going to have the most awesome reply: this thing. This thing is in fact known as an **umbilic torus** and it totally one ups the good old **Möbius strip**. First off a regular torus for those of you who don’t know is basically a donut shape, but the umbilic torus is a hell of a lot more interesting. The thing that’s really cool about it is that like the Möbius strip it really only has one side. **If you start at one point and move along the side you will eventually get back to the starting point after “going around” the torus three times.**

(via capntrips)

The Logarithmic Spiral

Now all you guys who are like “Yeah man the Fibonacci spiral is awesome” can just take a back seat here, because here we have the coolest of all spirals: the logarithmic spiral. Truth be told just about every time you’ve heard someone talk about the Fibonacci (or more accurately known Golden Spiral) they’ve been talking about this guy and just not realized it. The logarithmic spiral is given by the equation r=ae^(bθ) where r is the radius, a & b are positive constants and θ is the angle around the origin.

The logarithmic spiral also pops up quite often in nature, being the mathematical pattern behind such things as nautilus shells, Romanesco broccoli, spiral galaxies, the Mandelbrot set, storms, ferns and even sea horses.