Whether you have an abiding interest in insect biology, or simply enjoy watching events that happen very, very quickly played back very, very slowly (and who doesn’t?), this short video from the Evolutionary Biology and Behavior Research Lab at the North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences and North Carolina State University is a dazzlingly wild ride. Guided by the biologist Adrian Smith, who heads the lab, the film captures a series of 11 different winged insects – including a praying mantis, beetles and weevils – as they propel into flight at a riveting 3,200 frames per second, and are slowed down roughly 200 times for your viewing pleasure. For more of Smith’s nifty camerawork, watch Moths in Slow Motion.
Video by Ant Lab
video
Sports and games
The brutality and beauty of the West African martial art of ‘dambe’
15 minutes
video
Biology
Flicker through the eclectic beauty and biological diversity of 2,400 leaves
3 minutes
video
Art
The female Abstract Expressionists of New York shook the world of art
15 minutes
video
Metaphysics
Bertrand Russell wanted to kill off causation. Can contemporary philosophy rescue it?
8 minutes
video
Archaeology
From Roman pots to glass eyes, the shore of the river Thames teems with surprises
8 minutes
video
History of science
Bat-people on the Moon – what a famed 1835 hoax reveals about misinformation today
8 minutes
video
Biotechnology
What it’s like to wear a prosthetic that ‘feels’
6 minutes
video
Family life
Fifty years ago, a train collided with Jack and Betty’s car. Here’s how they remember it
9 minutes
video
Chemistry
A square inch in a Petri dish becomes a grand stage for chemical transformations
4 minutes