The Pineneedle Collective: Sheinside

Showing posts with label Sheinside. Show all posts

Tuesday 25 June 2013

Bambi and Mind Control

I've been stuck inside the house for far too long. It has not stopped raining in Sydney. I can't wait to trade it in for summer in a couple of days! I'm a very excited (and lucky) lady to be travelling again this year. But hey, look at this Les Folles Marquises necklace above - it reminds me of an Adventure Time character! It's sooooo cute, plus it's handmade. What do you think?

shirt - Thrifted

skirt - c/o Sheinside

necklace - c/o Les Folles Marquises

socks - c/o OASAP

shoes - c/o Yeswalker

beanie - Stolen from boyfriend

Here's a bit of incredible science news from Italy. Giving mobility back to paralysed people using science! The man in the video below has not been able to walk, move or feel his legs for two years. This exoskeleton is now under his control, and has helped him to walk for the first time since he was in a car accident that severed his spinal cord. The exoskeleton is part of a project that aims to eventually give people movement by correlating brain-patterns to the exoskeleton, train them using virtual reality, and then allowing them to control it through thought alone. How cool it that? Check out the the Mindwalker website here and the video of it in action below!

Monday 24 June 2013

Rainy Day & Silkworms

The rain has been relentless for the past few days in Sydney, and isn't forecast to stop for a sizeable chunk of the week. It's good in a way, because going from winter to summer in Italy next week will be made even lovelier after coming from such awful weather, but it's also very frustrating because I had about 50 different outfits to post here before I left!

I have been wanting some kitty shoes for such a long time now, though I'm glad I held out for these ones because they actually fit me (unlike all the pairs I tried to squeeze my feet into while I was in Tokyo earlier this year). These ones are awesome - they are both suede and creeper-style with a slight heel, and, well, they have cat faces on them. And anything with a cat face is basically instantly fantastic.

dress - c/o Sheinside

belt - Vintage

cardigan - Forever 21 (old)

socks - c/o OASAP

hat - c/o Wholesale

shoes - c/o Sammydress

I always wanted to design my own wedding dress, if I were to one day get married. I always thought that I'd just design the structure of the dress, but now that I'm going into molecular biology, maybe I'll be able to help make the fabric too - and own the geekiest dress ever.

This dress was made out of silk from transgenic silkworms, who can produce glowing silk.

Image source

These glowing silkworms are created by inserting a sequence of DNA that encodes a glowing fluorescent protein into the same region of the DNA that encode the instructions for making silk proteins. So the silkworms are exactly the same as ordinary silkworms, and still make silk in the same way, except that their silk comes out glowing.

The medical applications of silk are vast, and it is now commonly used in medicine and surgery. Because the body's immune system doesn't reject silk, it can be used to make artificial arteries and other tissues. But being able to work with a glowing material, that is clearly distinguishable from human flesh, could potentially make things are lot easier for surgeons! Although making a glowing dress out of the glowing silk maybe isn't as necessary an advance as making glowing arteries, it was a good way to draw attention to the research, and well, it's also pretty damn cool.

Saturday 22 June 2013

Hot Air Balloons and Aeroplanes

Les Folles Marquises, a gorgeous little etsy store, sent me some of the cutest ever necklaces! I can't even tell you how in love I am with this handmade doll necklace. I wore it to my exam as my good-luck charm (not that I'm at all superstitious nor believe she bestowed good luck upon me, but being able to look at the necklace during my exam did make me smile! Which has gotta help, right?)

As a side note, Les Folles Marquises, according to google translate, is "The Crazy Canopies" in English - any French speakers want to tell me if that is at all correct? What a cute name for a cute store, though! And although you'll all know me as an advocate of cheap clothes, if something is handmade this well, it's definitely worth paying more for.

I've been making some pretty great thrift-shop finds lately, like this pink cardigan and velvet fitted blazer. Every winter I only ever seem to have one cardigan and one coat which I end up wearing every day, which just makes winter even more depressing, so this year I am making an effort to own quite a few different coats, sweaters and cardigans so I can mix and match them (almost) as frequently as my dresses! Op-shops are definitely the best place to get coats and cardigans from, especially as they are usually under $10 - I don't think I've owned many "new" ones in quite a number of years.

dress - c/o Sheinside

necklace - c/o Les Folles Marquises

cardigan - Thrifted

blazer - Thrifted

hat - c/o Wholesale

socks - c/o OASAP

shoes - Yeswalker

And isn't this balloon-print Sheinside dress super cute, and just the perfect amount of quirky? Speaking of Sheinside, I have the winner of the Sheinside giveaway to announce. Is this you below? If so... congratulations! You have won a $100 gift voucher to spend at Sheinside. And I highly recommend the dress I am currently wearing ;)

So I'm going on an plane to Italy in just a week's time from now. Whenever I go on an aeroplane, at at least one point in the flight I will freak out and go "HOW ARE WE POSSIBLY DOING THIS?!" Knowing really nothing about physics, I am as ignorant as caveman trying to comprehend a smartphone (in fact... I don't really know much about that one, either). I just think that the fact that something as big and heavy as a plane full of people hanging around apparently weightless in the air is insane. And if anyone asked me how planes stayed in the air, I probably wouldn't be able to give them a very good answer, either, apart from mumbling something vague about thrust and lift. And I like to know how things work, rather than just blindly accepting them as fact.

So flight is actually kind of simple on the surface. There are four main forces all vying for dominance of your aircraft. You have thrust, which is what the engines provide - propelling you forward - drag, which pulls you backwards, weight, which drags you back down towards the earth, and lift, which is the one that holds you up in the air and is provided by the wings.

Lift is the one that helps hold a super heavy object up in the air, and is the cause of my freaking-out.

(Image source)

Aeroplane wings give you lift, because of the relative differences in speed between a solid object (the wings) and a fluid object (the air). The wing deflects the air above and below the wing, splitting it into two directions. The shape of the wing makes sure that the air that goes over the top moves faster than the air on the bottom. And when air speeds up, its pressure drops, so there is more pressure pushing up from the bottom of the wing, than from the top of the wing. That's how you get lifted up into the air!

The speed of sound is what is known as "Mach 1", and commercial planes don't fly this fast, however, the plane I am going on travels at Mach 0.85. That is 85% of the speed of sound, or about 280 metres per second. That is just a little over 1000 kilometres an hour (621 mph). That's... really, really fast. And a good way to segue into this XKCD comic. Speculative physics is even more fun than actual physics.

If you could make a stereo fly past someone at twice the speed of sound (Mach 2), then would it sound like it was playing backwards to someone who was sitting by?

The answer is yes, the song would sound like it was playing backwards. The stereo is flying faster than the sound it is playing can travel (sound travels at the speed of... well... sound), so the stereo would reach you first, followed by the sound it emitted one second ago, then two seconds ago, then three seconds ago, etc.

I can hardly wrap my head around it, but I think that it is one of the coolest thought experiments ever (plus, it's an awesome fact to tell people at parties). Read the whole comic here (especially if you've never seen XKCD's 'What If?' site before.)

Thursday 20 June 2013

Rose Gardens and Space Telescopes

I am a very happy lady tonight, because I have finished my exams! I think my weeks of non-stop studying really paid off as well, which makes finishing them all the sweeter. Nonetheless, I am going to be doing some mad blogging for the next week or so before I head off overseas, so if you visit here daily you'll almost certainly see something new each time ;)

Isn't this dress Sheinside sent me gorgeous? It just makes me want to have a picnic in a rose garden. Unfortunately I couldn't find any roses to take photos among - it being the middle of winter in Sydney and all. This pretty park did a good job serving as the backdrop, though.

I was so happy with the shoes that Yeswalker sent me as part of a sponsored post a few months ago (these ones) that I went and bought a couple of pairs with my own money, these red ones included. They're soooo cute and comfortable, and were also sent with free postage. I got two pairs for $15 each which is seriously good. These are going to be my Italy-trip walking-shoes! (I will never ever wear practical walking shoes, not even for travelling. Sorry, feet, but runners are just too ugly.)

dress - c/o Sheinside

cardigan - Thrifted

tights - c/o OASAP

necklace - c/o Merrin & Gussy

hat - c/o Wholesale

shoes - Yeswalker

You guys. This is the power of crowd-funding. 12,000 people (at the time I write this) have pledged money to a kickstarter project to fund an educational Space Telescope called ARKYD. There's 10 days left if you want to get yourself a "space selfie" (in fact, I think that's probably half the reason why the project has done so well. I am considering getting a space selfie of my favourite outfit just so I can put it on the blog in a science segment. If enough of you tell me that I should...).

Right now though, I'm completely exhausted (and vaguely aware that I might be writing nonsense) so I will leave it at that. Good night from Sydney, and I hope you're all having/have had a super good day!

Wednesday 12 June 2013

The Illusion of Reality

So I'm blogging again so soon... but I swear I'm not procrastinating on studying (maybe!)

Even though I've been non-stop studying the last few days, do you think I'd just wear comfortable clothes? Nah. This is about as "comfy" as I'll get, haha. I actually spent the morning in my pyjamas, but it's also nice to get dressed up for no reason - I feel like it helps me maintain my sanity! Which, at exam time, is always a good thing.

pants - c/o Sheinside

sweater - Thrifted

necklace - Claire's (Japan)

beanie - stolen from boyfriend

Here's more stuff that I'm trying to cram for my exams! But it's super interesting, don't worry ;)

So much of what we think are solid "facts" about the world we live in are entirely made up by our brains. I didn't realise this until this year, but there is nothing inherently "blue" about an electromagnetic wavelength of 450nm, or inherently "red" about a wavelength of 750nm - yet when these wavelengths of light hit our eyes, we experience blue and red colours.

Here's some amazing facts about colour vision and your brain (read these two posts about colour perception if you don't know much about it!)

Your brain keeps colours constant. A purple wig keeps on looking purple with different kinds of light shining on it (i.e. when you move from inside to outside). Outside light is really blue, but inside light is really yellow - yet the purple wig keeps looking basically the same colour the whole time - even though the actual light being reflected to your eye from the wig has changed vastly in wavelength.

And it's all got to do with context - you use the colour of other things in your world to determine what the colour of things should be. This is called colour constancy.

Don't believe me? Both of this girl's eyes are the exact same shade of grey.

Still don't believe me? This is what happens if you remove everything from the image except for the eyes.

(image from here)

There are also impossible colours that could never be perceived (though you can try here by crossing your eyes). This includes "bluish yellow" and "greenish red". You can't create them (I'm talking about mixing light here, not paints) - whenever you mix these opponent colours you just get grey. Apparently, you could never perceive these mixes of light. What's different about these colours that makes them different from mixing yellow and green, for instance? Again, this isn't anything unique about the physics of light - these colours are only "impossible" because your brain says so!

One more: after images (ignore the seedy music on the video, it's actually really cool.) Your brain makes up colours that don't even exist, just because it was tired of the ones it was looking at.

Thursday 6 June 2013

Lilac Stripes and Recording Your Dreams

Would it ruin these last few posts if I told you the main reason I took the photos all knees-up is because I fell down some stairs, hurt my ankle, and couldn't wear anything but giant comfy socks? Haha. Just *imagine* that I'm wearing some super cool lace-up creepers here, not fluffy pink bed socks.

I'm particularly in love with anything zebra-like lately, so these shorts from Sheinside are a welcome new addition to my wardrobe. They look great paired with a cropped shirt or cropped sweater of any kind. I can't wait to wear them together with some highly impractical shoes ;)

blouse - c/o Romwe
shorts - c/o Sheinside
tights - c/o OASAP

Enjoy this amazing video from ASAP science! Even though I'd already been introduced to most of the concepts in it, it still blew my mind!

I hope you're all very very well!

Monday 3 June 2013

$100 Giftcard Giveaway from Sheinside // CLOSED

I have an exciting giveaway to bring you all today by a long-time sponsor of my blog, Sheinside! You may have seen me wearing Sheinside items in the past (see here, here, here and here). They're one of my favourite online stores, because they sell really eye-catching and often quite unusual pieces. So I'm super excited to offer one $100 giftcard to the store, to spend on whatever you would like!

Here's how to enter:
1. Register on Sheinside
2. Like Sheinside's Facebook page
3. Leave a comment on this post with your name and email address (the same one you used to register on Sheinside)

That's all you need to do!

Extra entries *leave a separate comment for each one or they won't be counted!*
4. Like The Pineneedle Collective on Facebook
5. Follow me on Twitter
6. Follow me on GFC or Bloglovin' (and leave the account name you follow with in the comments!)

And that's it, good luck! Giveaway will finish on the 18th of June and it is open internationally.

Friday 31 May 2013

Stripes and Mosaics

What an adorable pinafore dress I received in the mail this morning! Simple and stripey, all it needed to be dressed up (in my opinion) was this vintage Mickey Mouse club badge and a simple cropped top. And I'm totally embracing the last day of "non-winter" by sitting in the sunshine while studying and (sneakily) blogging. I am pretty jealous of all of you in the Northern Hemisphere who are going to be starting summer tomorrow :'(

Just to let you know, my posts are going to become a little bit less frequent over the next month as I head into my final university exams for the semester, but I'll endeavour to keep posting at least 2 or 3 times a week! Having something else to focus on other than studying keeps me somewhat sane, so I'm not going to do what I did last year and abandon you guys while my exams are going. It was good for my grades, but not so much for my sanity.

striped pinafore dress - c/o She Likes | socks - c/o Oasap | shoes - Bodyline | shirt - c/o Sheinside | badge - gift from my friend (thrifted)

Continuing on this little genetics theme I've got going on... I'm going to talk about something quite related to genetic chimerism, which is known as mosaicism. In chimeras (which I talked about last week), the organism ends up with two different sets of DNA within their body because of the fusion of two zygotes (the stage before becoming an embryo) in the womb. This means that a chimera's non-identical twin is alive inside them. Pretty sci-fi stuff, right?

Well, organisms with mosaicism came from a single zygote (meaning they didn't absorb their own twin), but still have more than one set of DNA within the cells in their bodies. How does this happen?

Similar to chimeras, the process begins very early in development while the baby is still in the womb. When dividing (as cells do very rapidly at the beginning of development), some cells get confused and don't replicate their DNA correctly. A mutation occurs in one of the cells which goes unnoticed, and continues to happily divide. Cells with different sets of DNA continue to grow within the baby, and if the mutation isn't really serious, the baby will be born with a mutant trait which is seen in some cells, but not others. Mosaicism can affect any type of cell, including skin cells (see above). Do you have a tortiseshell cat? This is a really great (and easy to see) example of mosaicism!

I hope you're all having a great last day of autumn or spring, depending on where you are!