Wikipedia:Picture of the day/December 2005
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These featured pictures, as scheduled below, appeared as the picture of the day (POTD) on the English Wikipedia's Main Page in December 2005.
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December 1
A Interstate 80 is a major urban freeway through the Bay Bridge, in the San Francisco Bay Area (seen here in Berkeley, California ).
Photo credit: Minesweeper |
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December 2
The is not especially hard, and thousands make the ascent each summer. Photo credit: Stan Shebs |
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December 3
Photo credit: Óscar Ibáñez Fernández |
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December 4
The Taj Mahal in Agra, India, was commissioned by the 17th century Mughal Emperor Shah Jahan, as a mausoleum for his Persian wife, Mumtaz Mahal. Built over a period of 23 years, it is a masterpiece of Mughal architecture, featuring the finest materials from all over India and Asia. Its gleaming facade is clad in white marble from Rajasthan and inlaid with 28 types of precious and semi-precious stones. It is a UNESCO World Heritage Site considered to be of "outstanding universal value". Photo credit: Sandeep Dhirad |
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December 5
The Photo credit: Chris 73 |
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December 6
Photo credit: Markus Bernet |
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December 7
Photo credit: Scott Bauer USDA |
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December 8
The Nellis Air Force Range and the Nevada Test Site. These contain the Yucca Mountain repository, the Tonopah Test Range, and the secret Area 51 facility.
Illustration credit: Finlay McWalter |
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December 9
An image of Scanning Electron Microscope (SEM), a type of electron microscope capable of producing high resolution images of a sample surface. Due to the manner in which the image is created, SEM images have a characteristic 3-dimensional quality and are useful for judging the surface structure of the sample.
Photo credit: Rippel Electron Microscope Facility |
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December 10
Photo credit: PiccoloNamek |
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December 11
Photo credit: Debivort |
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December 12
The Photo credit: Adrian Pingstone |
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December 13
The order Mantodea (or Praying mantis) consists of between 1,800 and 2,000 species, of which a majority are in Mantidae .
Mantids are notable for their large size and nimble reflexes. They are masters of predators themselves, and to better snare their victims. Some species in Africa and Australia are able to turn black within a few days of a fire in the region to blend in with the fire ravaged landscape.
Photo credit: PiccoloNamek |
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December 14
The Photo credit: Jaap Folmer |
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December 15
The Photo credit: U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service |
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December 16
Square A is exactly the same shade of grey as square B. |
An optical illusion is any illusion that deceives the human visual system into perceiving something that is not present or incorrectly perceiving what is present. There are physiological illusions and cognitive illusions. A mirage is an example of a natural illusion that is an optical phenomenon, another example is the variation in the apparent size of the Moon (smaller when overhead, larger when near the horizon), this is not an optical phenomenon, but rather a cognitive or perceptual illusion. Photo credit: Edward H. Adelson |
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December 17
The Photo credit: Daniel Schwen |
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December 18
The |
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December 19
The Photo credit: Hajor |
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December 20
In 1965, as the Vietnam War escalated, the United States committed some 125,000 troops to support the southern Republic of Vietnam. Here a young Marine private waits on the beach during the troop landings at Da Nang, Vietnam on August 3, 1965. Photo credit: Unknown - NARA archive |
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December 21
The 1917 These before and after aerial photographs, show the effect of the extensive bombardment during the battle. Photo credit: Imperial War Museum |
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December 22
Photo credit: PiccoloNamek |
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December 23
hulls of large ships, and structural components for buildings. The first signs of use of iron come from the Sumerians and the Egyptians, where around 4000 BC, small items were being fashioned from iron recovered from meteorites .
Photo credit: NASA |
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December 24
Main tycho remnant |
This is a electrons .
Photo credit: NASA/CXC/Rutgers/ |
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December 25
The Sydney Harbour. The dramatic water vista of the bridge together with the nearby Sydney Opera House (left) is an iconic image. The bridge is affectionately known as "the Coathanger" by many Sydneysiders on account of its arch-based design.
Photo credit: Diliff |
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December 26
Pillar corals are a type of hard coral which live in the western Atlantic Ocean. They are one of the digitate corals which resemble fingers, or a cluster of cigars growing up from the sea floor, but without any secondary branching. Pillar corals can grow to be up to 2.5 m (8 ft) tall. They can grow on both flat and sloping sea floors at a depth of between 1 and 20 m (65 ft). They are one of the few types of hard coral whose polyps can commonly be seen feeding during the day. Photo credit: NOAA |
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December 27
Hay is dried grass typically stored to feed domestic animals in winter when not enough fresh grass is available. It is normally produced by allowing excess pasture paddocks to grow, then just before the grasses flower the pasture is mowed and the cut grass allowed to dry in the sun for two or three days. Traditional thatched haystacks, seen here in Romania, store the dried hay and protect it from rain until needed. In the 20th century these have largely been replaced by mechanical balers, that gather and compact the hay into rectangular or rolled bales for easier storage. Photo credit: Paulnasca |
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December 28
Photo credit: pdphoto.org |
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December 29
In mountainous areas, the visibility can be up to 70 to 100 km. However, visibility is often reduced somewhat by air pollution and high humidity. Various weather stations report this as haze (dry) or mist (moist). Fog and smoke can reduce visibility to near zero, making driving extremely dangerous.
Photo credit: Alan Mak |
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December 30
The On its opening day the bridge exhibited alarmingly large lateral synchronisation with the sway, which forced the motion to uncomfortable levels. As a result the bridge was swiftly nicknamed the Wobbly Bridge. Two days later the bridge was closed to retrofit dampers to correct the problem.
Photo credit: Paul Lomax |
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December 31
Winter is one of the four seasons of temperate zones. Meteorological winter is the season having the shortest days (which vary greatly according to latitude) and the lowest temperatures. During winter, there is much snow and cold, especially in areas that are farther away from the Blizzards often develop and cause many delays. A rare meteorological phenomenon encountered during winter is ice fog, which is composed of ice crystals suspended in the air and occurs only at very low temperatures (at least 10 degrees below zero).
Photo credit: Richard Fabi |
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