I Am Trying to Believe. Well, maybe not. (Previously: Best, shortest review of a NIN cd, ever.)
posted by loquacious on Feb 13, 2007 - 59 comments

Order from chaos! Fill a cylindrical bucket with water and make it so the bottom can spin. At certain speeds, stable regular polygonal shapes will spontaneously form at the turbulent surface of the water. See the video. [2.6MB avi] [via last week's PRL]
posted by sergeant sandwich on May 10, 2006 - 28 comments

Vortical interfaces between immiscible fluids - a slow-motion video of various vortexes of Newtonian and non-Newtonian fluids, set to Soundgarden's Black Hole Sun, with explanatory captions. Pleasing to the eyes.
posted by Jimbob on Mar 31, 2004 - 9 comments

Gallery of Fluid Dynamics. 'One of the most attractive features of fluid mechanics is the beauty of the flows one encounters. Whether one is observing vortex streets, the potential flow around an airfoil or body, shock refraction or diffraction, or waves breaking on a beach the aesthetic appeal of fluid mechanics is impossible to deny. '
posted by plep on Jun 28, 2003 - 6 comments

The Pitch Drop Experiment. Everyone should know by now that 'glass is a supercooled liquid' is an urban legend. But there are true liquids that appear solid at room temperature. Pitch, a petroleum derivative, is one of them. The Blair Pitch Pro Pitch Drop Experiment, begun in 1927, drips pitch out of a funnel, at roughly one drop every ten years. It has a webcam [RealPlayer req.], with a short canned loop of audio explaining the experiment's origins. I tell you, I'm on the edge of my seat watching this thing!
Swiped from The Cellar.
posted by Slithy_Tove on Jun 6, 2002 - 22 comments