Peter Rombough, a biologist at Brandon University in Canada, has conducted a study on the functions of fish gills. He concludes that although gills may allow a fish to breathe, that might not be the original reason why they evolved:

In order to keep from shriveling like your fingers in the bathtub, fish must constantly exchange ions, such as sodium and potassium, with the water. Larval fish can exchange ions through their skin, and early fish likely used rudimentary gill structures known as branchial baskets. But when the salinity of the water changes rapidly--as happened when fish invaded freshwater habitats--fish would have needed a much more efficient way of exchanging ions with their environment. That means large, complex gills.

Link via reddit | Photo: US Department of the Interior

Iberico ham began selling in London for £1,800 for a 15-pound leg joint. It's the world's most expensive pork, raised in western Spain and delivered in luxurious conditions:

The pigs were fed on a diet of acorns and roots to give the ham a distinctive flavour.

After being slaughtered their ham was salted and cured for three years, before going on sale in a hand-made wooden box wrapped in an apron made by a Spanish tailor.

Link via J-Walk Blog | Photo: BBC

(YouTube Link)

YouTube user brusspup is fond of creating optical illusions. We've recently featured one that looks like two lug nuts. His latest is this Pac-Man scene painted on the walls of a house.

via Urlesque

In this infographic, Stephen Von Worley observes that the number of discrete colors in a box of Caryola Crayons doubles about every 28 years. That's an annual growth rate of 2.56%. Von Worley writes:

If the Law holds true, Crayola’s gonna need a bigger box, because by the year 2050, there’ll be 330 different crayons! Shortly thereafter, frazzled packaging designers rejoice, for to the rescue comes a revolution in household appliances: the new-fangled Replicator-Dissociator! Load it with the Crayola plugin, and you’re seconds away from every shade in the rainbow – no boxes required!

Link via Make

Artist Cole Blaq made a display that looks like fire -- except that it's made of LEGOs. It is a larger version of a sculpture that he presented at a LEGO competition in Munich. More pictures at the link.

Link via Geekologie | Artist's Blog

(YouTube Link)

Jim Moyer's hobby is building miniature engines. The one above, which he claims is the smallest V-8 engine in the world, is a 1/6 scale model of the 327 cubic inch motor in a 1964 Chevrolet Corvette.

Link via Ace of Spades HQ

NASA is shutting down the space shuttle program and so is trying to sell off its remaining merchandise at increasingly low prices. It's already slashed the price for a (pre-owned) shuttle from $42 million to $28.8 million:

When the National Aeronautics and Space Administration in December 2008 put out the call seeking buyers at museums, schools and elsewhere, the agency received about 20 inquiries. An agency spokesman, Mike Curie, said he expected more interest, especially with the discount.

“We’re confident that we’ll get other takers,” Mr. Curie said Friday.

The Discovery is already promised to the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum. The Atlantis and the Endeavour are up for grabs. It is possible that the Enterprise, a shuttle prototype that never made it to space, will also be available. The Enterprise is currently at the Smithsonian.

Link via Instapundit | Photo: NASA

A woman named Lukka Sigurdardottir made this edible wedding dress. Or, alternatively, a wearable wedding cake.

http://gatherandnest.com/?p=3208 via Digg | Image: Gather and Nest

Ukrainian artist Oksana Mas created an enormous mosaic of the Virgin Mary composed of 15,000 wooden Easter eggs at the Santa Sophia cathedral in Kiev. The work was unveiled yesterday.

Elaborate Easter eggs -- "pysanky" -- are a major artistic tradition in the Ukraine. Gallery at the link.

Link via DudeCraft | Artist's Website | Photo: Sergei Supinksy/AFP/Getty

No, Chanel isn't marketing to the ComicCon crowd. This is a work by artist Tetsuya Noguchi in homage to the famous French design house. Pink Tentacle assembled a photogallery of the suit.

Link

Architect Piet Hein Eek built this log cabin as a study for musician Hans Liberg in the Dutch town of Hilversum. Rather than build log walls perpendicular to each other, two sides consist of exterior end cuts. You can view an extensive photo gallery (inside and out) at the link.

Link via Make

Human ambition expresses itself in myriad ways. Some people climb the highest mountains or journey into the unknown. Others build technological marvels or discover the wonders of science. But perhaps the greatest among us sit around and watch TV all week.

Such is the dream of Glyn Stott, a Simpsons fan from Merthyr Tydfil, UK, who hopes to be entered into the Guinness Book of World Records for watching all 451 episodes of The Simpsons, back to back, without resting:

His six-day feat will be overseen by officials to ensure he does not fall asleep.

Mr Stott, from Merthyr Tydfil, South Wales, said: "I'm a huge fan of the show and I've seen every episode but watching them continuously for almost a week will be a feat of endurance.

"The judges have to make sure my eyes are firmly fixed on the screen – I have to be seen to be concentrating all the way through."

The current record for non-stop television watching is four days, set by an American viewer.

Link | Image: Fox

A US company has created a punctuation mark that it hopes will be used to express sarcasm. It can be downloaded for a small charge and then inserted into documents with a Ctrl key command. The company proposes that the SarcMark can be used to avoid confusion in emails:

Anyone concerned that the irony of their email or text message might not be appreciated by its recipient can use the symbol to close their sentence, thereby avoiding awkward misunderstandings.

The symbol – a dot inside a single spiral line – can be installed onto any PC running Windows 7, XP or Vista, as well as Macs and Blackberry mobile devices.

Link | Image: SarcMark

The comic strip Calvin & Hobbes often included Calvin's disturbing snowmen. We've previously featured one such scene recreated with real snowmen, but WebUrbanist has a post filled with them.

Link via Nerdcore

Break out the leisure suits, because French artist Michel de Broin used a crane to heft a huge mirror ball 50 meters over the Jardin du Luxembourg in Paris. It measures 7.5 meters across and is composed of a thousand mirrors. Can you dig it?

http://www.lifelounge.com/Michel-de-Broin-and-the-biggest-disco-ball-the-world-has-ever-seen.aspx via Gizmodo (where there's a video) | Artist's Website | Photo: Michel de Broin