Apoptosis

Apoptosis: the process of programmed cell death, typically occurring in a multicellular organism when an individual cell is damaged beyond repair by stress or viral infections. A series of biochemical events causes dramatic changes in a cells morphology, including changes to the membrane, cell shrinkage, nuclear fragmentation, chromatin condensation, and DNA fragmentation.

 

--

 

What you see here is about 3 feet thick of beautifully clear permanent cave ice deep in a lava tube in Lava Beds National Monument, the least visited (and most remote) federal park in California. I used a flashlight and some creative illumination techniques to render the scene in a single 3 minute exposure. All in all I spent about 5 hours in the pure darkness (not a single photon down there!) working on this image, over the course of two days.

 

No, this has absolutely nothing to do with cells. But I imagine that the rocks, ice bubbles, and strange forms, resemble a cell undergoing apoptosis, when the membrane starts to fall apart and the organelles are broken down. Plus, that word just sounds too darn cool not to use ;)

 

For more discussion on the technique/place you can see the discussion on NPN

 

And a larger version is on my site: LARGE!

 

 

----

 

Prints available: http://artinnaturephotography.com/

Adventures for your entertainment and edification: artinnature.wordpress.com/

 

 

 

Done