Fifty years ago today, twelve nations signed The Antarctic Treaty, regulating research activity, economic exploitation, and territorial claims in Antarctica. To mark this occasion, Annie C. Lee of Fast Company has compiled eleven interesting facts about the frozen continent:

3. Antarctica's biggest population center is the U.S.-operated McMurdo Station. In the summer, the community can swell to more than 1,000 people; this past winter, there were just 153. 4. Antarctica's two-letter Internet suffix is ".aq." Internet access is via satellite; a dish on Black Island provides 10-MB-per-second service to McMurdo. 5. Tourism is one of Antarctica's two main industries. Antarctica had 37,858 tourists last year. Most visitors arrived by sea -- a typical 10-day cruise to the region runs from $5,000 to $10,000 per person -- and nearly all landed on the Antarctic Peninsula. No ship carrying more than 500 passengers may land in Antarctica.

Link | Antarctic Treaty | Image: NASA

These men are beating each other senseless using fluorescent tube light bulbs as weapons. This is apparently a sport in Japan. I can't find much information about it online, so I take it that it is not a widely popular sport. One blogger said "It's like WWF meets WTF." -- which seems like a good summation. There are more pictures at the link. Content warning: graphic violence.

Link via Geekologie | Image: Blue Circlet

Minimum Wage Machine by artist Blake Fall-Conroy spits out $7.15 per hour in pennies as a person turns the crank. Fall-Conroy writes to Make:

In the future, I see possibility in a lot of these machines hooked into a grid, with people performing basic human labor for money. Perhaps a new form of renewable energy generation? A new kind of supercomputer with thousands of people performing basic calculations at minimum wage "stations" across the world? Who knows?

More pictures and technical details at the link.

Link | Artist's Website | Image: Blake Fall-Conroy

Sidi Ergo has pictures and descriptions of the most expensive bicycles ever made, including models plated in gold and encrusted with diamonds. This model, the Koga Kimera, isn't quite so luxurious. But developed by UK bike-maker Koga for Dutch Olympic competitor Theo Bos Koga, it's priced at almost one million dollars. The Kimera is said to have the lowest wind resistance of any bicycle ever made.

http://www.sidiergo.com/blog/10-most-expensive-bicycles-on-earth/ via The Presurfer | Photo: Oobject

Minneapolis-based illustrator Brock Davis painted Expressionist screenshots of classic arcade games, such as the above Donkey Kong. Two more at the link.

Link via Geekologie | Artist's Website | Flickr Stream | Interview with the Artist

This door by the architectural firm Matharaoo Associates is designed to resemble a sine wave. Now in the home of a diamond merchant in Surat, India, the door measures 5.2m high and 1.7m wide and is made from 40 blocks of teak. Thanks to 160 pulleys and 80 ball bearings, it pushes open easily, despite its weight. More pictures at the link.

Link via Fast Company | Photo: Dinesh Mehta

Researchers at Eindhoven University in the Netherlands have recently grown synthetic pork meat in a laboratory setting. Lois Rogers writes for The Times:

The advent of so-called “in-vitro” or cultured meat could reduce the billions of tons of greenhouse gases emitted each year by farm animals — if people are willing to eat it.

So far the scientists have not tasted it, but they believe the breakthrough could lead to sausages and other processed products being made from laboratory meat in as little as five years’ time.

They initially extracted cells from the muscle of a live pig. Called myoblasts, these cells are programmed to grow into muscle and repair damage in animals.

The cells were then incubated in a solution containing nutrients to encourage them to multiply indefinitely. This nutritious “broth” is derived from the blood products of animal foetuses, although the intention is to come up with a synthetic solution.

Link via Popular Science | Image: US Department of the Interior

It's a simple and elegant concept: saw a coconut in two, then reattach the halves with a zipper. The result is an instant handbag. These are popular crafts for sale to tourists on Lamu Island off the coast of Kenya.

Link via Make | Photo: AfricaGadget

The Medium Awards is an annual materials sciences recognition program in the UK. Cliff Kuang of Fast Company has a slideshow of seven winners, including a carbon fiber alternative made from carrots, a sponge that absorbs oil but not water, and a very lightweight substitute for kevlar. Pictured above is an inflatable tent made from concrete-embedded cloth. Just add water, and it turns into a hardened structure.

Link | Photo: Concrete Canvas

(YouTube Link)

This video shows four different levels of Super Mario Bros. in which the sound effects were synchronized to play four different musical parts in the Queen song "Don't Stop Me Now." If that explanation doesn't make sense, it will about a minute into the video. Its origin is a little unclear, as the information is in Japanese. I'll update as I learn more.

via Geekologie

Inspired by this scene from the BBC show The Young Ones, the how-to blog Instructables turned an old VCR into a functional toaster. It even prints "VHS" on the face of every piece of bread toasted. Video at the link.

Link via Geek Crafts | Image: Instructables

Photo: Podkayne Studios

Etsy seller Podkayne Studios sells nativity sets that remember the Christmas story just a little bit differently. Dinosaur, Star Wars, Pokémon, Indiana Jones and other themes are available.

Link via Geekologie

Photo: Olivier Kosta-Théfaine

Paris-based artist Olivier Kosta-Théfaine burns images into ceilings using only a cigarette lighter. His medium is an extension of a common form of street art in the neighborhood in which he grew up. Pictured above is an untitled piece created in Brussels in 2007. You can view more images and read an interview with the artist at the link.

Link via DudeCraft | Artist's Website | Video Interview with the Artist

Steve Irvine makes ceramic pinhole cameras. He writes "I like the organic look of these cameras which contrasts with our usual notions of cameras being machine-made, high tech devices." The cameras are quite functional, as you can see from the photograph below, taken with the camera above.



Link via Make | Photos: Steve Irvine

The zoo of Warsaw, Poland, has a pair of prehistoric humans (or actors depicting them) on display over the weekend:

Organiser Maria Mastalerz says the weeklong "performance" aims to attract interest in a play, "Caveman," showing in the Polish capital. But she says it also carries a message that humans today are not all that different from their prehistoric ancestors.

Dressed in furs and animal skins, the young woman and man smoked a fish over a fire Friday, poking it with a stick, or stared from behind bars at startled zoo visitors.

Video at the link.

Link via Stuff | Photo: AP