Highlights from the Wellcome Images advent calendar
14 December 2010
The advent calendar comes in the form of an image posted every day on the Wellcome Images Facebook page. See the image gallery below for a selection of some of our favourites.
Transmission electron micrograph of HIV particles
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IMAGE 1 of 4
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The advent calendar started on World Aids Day, so the first image was a transmission electron micrograph of HIV particles. HIV is the virus that causes AIDS, a disease that kills around 2 million people every year.
Image: R. Dourmashkin/Wellcome Images.
Image: R. Dourmashkin/Wellcome Images.
Bluetongue inner core proteins
IMAGE 2 of 4
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This looks like a Christmas decoration, but it’s actually the VP3 inner core protein of the bluetongue virus. The virus folds into two slightly different conformations, highlighted in green and red in this molecular model. These different structures fit together to form the symmetrical arrangement shown here.
Image: Jonathan Grimes, University of Oxford/Wellcome Images.
Image: Jonathan Grimes, University of Oxford/Wellcome Images.
Boys having a snowball fight
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IMAGE 3 of 4
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This quaint Victorian image may have been a local Christmas card. The text reads “Compliments of D.F. Onnen, pharmacist”, and on the reverse is an advert for Onnen’s German Fever and Arue Mixture.
Image: Wellcome Library, London.
Image: Wellcome Library, London.
A Kirlian photograph
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IMAGE 4 of 4
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Kirlian photography is named after Semyon Kirlian, who accidentally discovered that an object can create an image on a photographic plate if it is connected to a source of voltage. The voltage gives rise to a strong electric field at the edges of the object, which creates small corona discharges that make the image on the plate.
Image: N. Seery/Wellcome Images.
Image: N. Seery/Wellcome Images.
If you can't wait to see what the advent calendar will show tomorrow, why not play a few rounds of the new Wellcome Collection Memory Game, which features a variety of visual treats from Wellcome Images?
