An anonymous reader writes, “I am a computer programmer and amateur herpetologist. On my leg is Henry, a North Brazilian Boa constrictor — rare in captivity at the time. I brought him in for photos before we began, and again after it was completely healed. As you can see in this photo, his colors were altered in the tattoo to stand out better. It took 20 hours over the course of 14 months to complete and was done completely freehand. Each scale was drawn individually. This photo is so special, since he’s posed very much the way he came out on my leg, tongue and all. It’s not like I could give him instructions on what to do.”
Archive for the ‘Science Tattoo Emporium’ Category
The Posing Snake [Science Tattoo]
Graduating Into Entropy [Science Tattoo]
Ivanka writes,
I got this last week and as I’m sure you know, it’s the second law of thermodynamics (the original equation, by Clausius) before -N even represented entropy. This is a strange story, because I’m not a physics or math major, I’m a female philosophy person.
I really do love physics though, and I’m about to leave my home country and all my undergrad friends behind and go and do my MSc at LSE. So the sentiment behind this is that now, after undergrad, we begin to disseminate. Entropy.
It’s also a great boyfriend filtration system:
‘Can I have your number?’
‘Wait, what’s this mean?’
‘Um… I don’t know?’
‘Too bad, you were cute’ (walk off)
The Companion Molecule [Science Tattoos]
Scicurious, a blogger at Neurotopia with a PhD in physiology, writes,
The molecule is caffeine, and the tattoo itself was designed by artist Glendon Mellow of The Flying Trilobite. I got it to celebrate my PhD.
Why caffeine, you ask?
1) I had a friend once tell me that my friendship was like a hot cup of coffee. Warm, vivacious, stimulating, and comforting. It was one of the best compliments I ever received.
2) I have spent the last six years of my life studying drugs in various forms. Caffeine always spoke to me as a stimulant, because it is so different from other traditional drugs classified as stimulants. I’ve always been a little different myself.
3) I also spent the past six years studying various neurotransmitters. I will spend more years studying different neurotransmitters. Which ones I study and why will change over time, but caffeine will be with me through all of it. 
On Growth and Ink [Science Tattoo]
Alex, a graduate student studying human biology and evolution, writes, “As an undergraduate at I was fortunate enough to study On Growth and Form by D’Arcy Thompson. His synthesis of mathematics, classics and biology was an inspiration to me, and drove me to pursue science as a career. Though I am now studying to be a paleoanthropologist, my tattoo of an (idealized) ammonite fossil is a reminder to me of the material and mathematical processes behind all living things. Plus extinct cephalopods are more aesthetically appealing than hominin skulls.”
Love By The Numbers [Science Tattoo]
Josephine writes, “My mother was diagnosed with breast cancer on Valentine’s Day. Happy V-Day, right?? She, being the eternal matriarch of the family, called each child individually and told us the news. She is VERY upbeat and positive, and so we are, too. I am a mathematics major in college and when she told me the news, my sister and I both wanted tattoos in her honor. At first I wanted a blue whale, it being her favorite animal, but I went with a heart curve. In mathematics, as I’m sure you know, there are 6 heart curves. This is just one of them, and the least ‘busy.’ I am proud to display it on my right forearm for my mother through this trying time.”
There Are More Painful Things [Science Tattoo]
Corey writes, “I got this tattoo as an homage to the pain of my graduate work. It’s a model of fulvic acid which is a representation of natural organic matter in the soil. I work with this molecule for my grad work and I figured I might as well get it etched into my skin so I can look at it and say, ‘Well, at least it hurt less than grad school at Cornell.’”
Medusa [Science Tattoo]
Dave writes, “Following my degree in Zoology, I worked in public aquariums for several years before becoming a lecturer in Animal Science, so I’ve always has a bit of a ‘fishy’ background! I’m also studying stress in marine fish for a research degree. I’ve always been fascinated by evolution, and to reflect this, I decided to get inked with a Haeckel – this is a medusa from ‘Art Forms in Nature’. Haeckel was clearly a proponent of evolution, and although his ideas weren’t 100% correct, the man could draw!
“The tattoo is courtesy of the always-brilliant Jon Nott of Guildford, Surrey (U.K.).”
RadioLab Wants Your Extinct Tattoo
Here’s a message from Radiolab to my tattoo’d readers (you know who you are):
Hi, all, I’m with the National Public Radio-syndicated science show ‘Radiolab,’ that has a large national and international following (http://www.wnyc.org/shows/radiolab/). Mr. Zimmer appeared on our show last season, in the ‘Parasites’ episode.
I’m in search of people who have tattoos of extinct species of plant or animal, ideally people in the greater New York City area. We’re trying to gauge the feasibility of doing a video piece on this subject for Radiolab. Please let us know via radiolab@wnyc.org if you are itching to share your extinct species tattoo story with our funky radio show!
Perhaps we’ll be calling it VideoLab soon?
Update: Be sure to send a copy to me, too, for the Tattoo Emporium.
What Is Man? [Science Tattoo]
Todd Disotell of New York University writes,
As an evolutionary primatologist, I had a tattoo of Charles Darwin’s first drawing of an evolutionary tree put on my forearm to commemorate his birthday last year. This year for my birthday, I had Carolus Linnaeus‘ original 1735 definition of the order Primates tattooed onto my other forearm.
Understanding Extinct [Science Tattoo]
Cecilia writes, “I am working on my PhD in wildlife population genetics, and I can trace my passion for my research to a moment when I was in elementary school and we learned about the extinct dodo bird from Mauritius Island. At first, I could not understand what “extinct” meant, but as the concept sunk in that I would never see this bird, and no one else would ever see it again, I felt a deep sadness and sense of loss. Recently, as I was slogging through field and lab work and my ambition started sagging, I decided to get a dodo tattoo to remind myself why I chose this path. Extinction is forever, and we never know what we’ve lost until it’s gone. Some researchers believe that the dodo was the prime seed disperser for the tambalacoque tree that is declining in numbers because there hasn’t been a dodo around for over 300 years to abrade the seeds. If this is true, it would be a succinct example of how extinctions reverberate through ecosystems. I hope that my work will help prevent future extinctions of wildlife.”
Green Power [Science Tattoo]
Charlie writes, “I am a scientist at the University of Minnesota. In 1999, as an undergrad on a plant science internship, a friend and I were sitting on our dorm roof, wondering what the best nerdy science tattoo would be. The double helix down the leg or back was suggested, but we concluded that a chloroplast was a better fit for our scientific interests. As the photon-collecting organelle in plants, it’s the source of energy for nearly all plant life and a fascinating biochemical machine. At that point in our careers, we found something that would represent our fascination with plants, no matter what field we chose to pursue. He is in botanical education (and didn’t go through with the tattoo), I’m in horticulture.”
How Do *You* Spell Brain? [Science Tattoo]
Tim writes,
I’m a post-doctoral cognitive neuroscientist working in MR research at the University of Pittsburgh. I stumbled across the Science Tattoo Emporium and wanted to share my own science based ink.
The attached image shows my second tattoo and the most directly science-themed ink (although the others are also peripherally linked to the career I love so dear). The four hieroglyphic characters are the earliest written form of the word “brain” and are found in the Edwin Smith Surgical Papyrus. Dating back to seventeenth century BC Egypt, the papyrus is perhaps the first neurological case study describing the symptoms of head injuries and the odd fleshy matter that was often visible in the most gruesome of head wounds. These symbols and the story of the papyrus are the opening to the classic textbook “Principles of Neuroscience”, which I first came across when taking an undergraduate course in 2000. In honor of starting my graduate research career in studying the brain, I got this tattoo while attending a neuroscience conference in NYC in 2002.
Anyway, hope you enjoy. Thanks for putting together the gallery that lets me know I’m not the only geek crazy enough to make his passion a permanent part of his body.
