iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Matthias M. M. Meier @matthiasmmmeier.com · 18/08/2026

I am going to reuse that meme so many times...

The "wake up babe" meme - a man looking at his sleeping wife/girlfriend while laying behind her in bed, both wearing white clothes, while, strangly, it seems to be bright day - with the caption "new chondrule formation model just dropped!" underneath.

Matthias M. M. Meier @matthiasmmmeier.com · 07/08/2026

Für alle, die es immer noch nicht verstanden haben: ja, es gab auch schon früher vereinzelte "heisse Sommer". Doch mittlerweile ist jeder Sommer deutlich heisser als jene früheren heissen Sommer. Und übrigens: wenn es so weitergeht, werden es die kühlsten Sommer des Rests unseres Lebens sein...

A plot showing temperature change in Switzerland (from "show your stripes"), with blue colors indicating cooler years and red colors hotter years. A few hotter than average years, decades in the past, are labelled (in German) as "yes, there used to be hot summers...", while the last 20 years (which are thoroughly red) are labelled (again in German) "...but this is climate change".

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Matthias M. M. Meier @matthiasmmmeier.com · 18/05/2026

Suppose you are a tourist or other non-native riding a small train somewhere in Switzerland. What do you make of this sign?

A sign on the door of a train saying: "Please don't "Schletz" the Door - Thank You".

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Matthias M. M. Meier @matthiasmmmeier.com · 12/05/2026

My path of personal development as a director of a natural history museum is taking me to places I never thought I would go, even just a few years ago. 😉😊

The cover of the softcover book "The story of birds - a new history from their dinosaur origina to the present", by Steve Brusatte, is photographed at a slight angle. Several birds as well as two feathered dinosaurs can be seenon the cover.

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Matthias M. M. Meier @matthiasmmmeier.com · 05/04/2026

Needless nightmare agression of some architect against people with OCD... 🤨

View of a part of a modern, generally black building, with lowered shades, on a sunny day in spring. The lines formed by the windows and shades are all slightly and chaotically tilted against one another.

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Matthias M. M. Meier @matthiasmmmeier.com · 18/01/2026

Gotta make use of a beautiful day!

The Hoher Kasten mountain in Switzerland, snow covered in front of an almost clear blue sky. A few geeen hills below. A forest and a sking slope are visible in the foreground.

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Matthias M. M. Meier @matthiasmmmeier.com · 01/01/2026

Start of the new year. Just the northern slopes of an actively forming mountain range, ploughed by a fragment of an old continent drifting north, on a water-tripple-point planet with abundant indigenous life, orbiting a middle aged yellow dwarf near the corotation radius of its galaxy.

The northern alps, undulating to jagged terrain, slightly tilting to the right, some partially snow-covered mountainsand peaks are visible in the background. A few trees in the front. All of it under a clear, dark blue sky.

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Matthias M. M. Meier @matthiasmmmeier.com · 12/12/2025

Last Tuesday, I went to the hospital with a dinosaur to get an MRI... Working in a natural history museum allows you to say the weirdest things! ☺️🦕🏛️

The skull of an Edmontosaurus annectens mummy is shown laying on a bed, ready to be scanned in an MRI. Two persons are patially visible, one of them has a white doctor's coat.

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Matthias M. M. Meier @matthiasmmmeier.com · 23/11/2025

Please don't eat me Mr. (?) Snake Eagle, I am no reptile... Snake Eagles, thanks to climate change, are now breeding in Switzerland too...

A full-sized snake eagle taxidermy mounted on a short bar coming out of a wall in a museum exhibit. The bird looks exactly in the direction of the camera. In the background, other birds are visible, as is a mural showing trees and mountains.

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Matthias M. M. Meier @matthiasmmmeier.com · 05/11/2025

The Natural History Museum of St. Gallen has now officially become an Anomalocaris hunting ground! 👀😊🤘🌍

A life-sized, ca. half-meter long, model of an Anomalocaris, a arthropod hunter from the Cambrian, is seen in a museum setting. Underneath, a group of three Pikaia (also models, under glass) tries to escape. In the background, more objects can be seen, among them, trolobites and a dinosaur skeletton mount.

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Matthias M. M. Meier @matthiasmmmeier.com · 02/08/2025

Twingi gorge near Binn, Valais, Switzerland.

A valley with steep slopes covered by forest, and a river (the Binna) bareley visible at its bottom, barely visible. In the left foreground, a large tree casts its branches through the picture, in the back of the valley, a single, pointy peak stands against a blue, clouded sky. The atmosphere of the image is serene, calm, sunny, and you can almost smell the pine trees.

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Matthias M. M. Meier @matthiasmmmeier.com · 29/07/2025

Märjelen, near Aletsch glacier, Valais, Switzerland - today. Congrats to us for doing this hike with our four-year-old... (and his older siblings, who loved it)

A flat pond, with some stones, some plants, perhaps flowers, on some worn down rocks the glacier left behind when it retreated in the 19th century. In the background, the white vastness of the Aletsch glacier, streaked with dark moraines, between dark, partially snowcaped mountains. A blue, yet slightly cloudy sky stands above, and in the reflection of the pond.

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Matthias M. M. Meier @matthiasmmmeier.com · 25/06/2025

Above Chur, Canton of Grisons, Switzerland. Small but beautiful hike with the team.

Two trees obstruct the view over a green mountain valley, with a small city in the distance. A rock, grass and some smaller trees are in the foreground. There will be rain, later...

A view over the city of Chur in Switzerland. A mountain flank rises in the background, and some dramatic clouds are doing their thing above.

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Matthias M. M. Meier @matthiasmmmeier.com · 02/06/2025

Good morning and happy pride month to all of you humans out there from me and my little buddy, a colorful bug from our current exhibition on arthropods! (and thank you to the anonymous kid who made it!)

A colorful and joyful bug made from paper (colored by crayon in all rainbow colors) and some fluffy colorful legs,pinned to a blue background.

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Matthias M. M. Meier @matthiasmmmeier.com · 11/05/2025

Lake Thun near Sigriswil, Canton of Bern, Switzerland.

A panoramic view of blue-green Lake Thunersee in Switzerland, a dark/bright green forest in the foreground, with the pyramid-shaped Niesen mountain rising behind the lake and some clouds making dramatic shapes in the sky above.

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Matthias M. M. Meier @matthiasmmmeier.com · 10/04/2025

Woah. "Willard" is huge. Bigger than any other triceratops, apparently. At #SauriermuseumAathal.

A giant triceratops (partial) fossil recobstruction, illuminated in glowing pink and blue colors, "Willard", at Sauriermuseum Aathal, Switzerland.

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Matthias M. M. Meier @matthiasmmmeier.com · 09/02/2025

On the way back to Muscat, we visited the fort and castle of the ancient city of Nizwa, for a long time the seat of the Sultan of Oman. This is a beautiful country, full of potential. I hope to return there some day soon, with a new science project. And next time, I *will* find some meteorites! 😉

Th Nizwa fort seen from inside. A high, circular wall surrounds an interior area of about 50 m diameter, with some buildings on the area and a white flagpole that is higher than the image. In the distance behind the wall, a brown mountain range is visible.

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Matthias M. M. Meier @matthiasmmmeier.com · 07/02/2025

There is no such thing as an "almost" meteorite. But I thought this one was a really good candidate, but no: its a chert. So many cherts, camel dropings, charcoal, other dark stones. But no real meteorite today. Oh well. Back to Muscat tomorrow.

A black rock lies on a light, sandy ground, with a pen for scale nearby. The pen is about 5 times the length of the rock.

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Matthias M. M. Meier @matthiasmmmeier.com · 07/02/2025

Getting up with the sun today, after spending the night out in the desert. A new day for a new meteorite search!

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Matthias M. M. Meier @matthiasmmmeier.com · 06/02/2025

Today, we searched for meteorites - a known fall from 2022. Have you ever searched your car keys on a parking lot, for hours in the hot sun? Thats what it was like. Minus the key, plus a meteorite that perhaps isn't even there. Today, we had no luck. We'll probably try again tomorrow.

A very flat plane in the desert, a bright, almost white ground under a slightly cloudy sky. Two people are walking on it, looking away.

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Matthias M. M. Meier @matthiasmmmeier.com · 06/02/2025

Yesterday, we arrived in Sahmah, to service a second camera there. Here you see Martin Cupak from Curtin University, Perth accessing the camera computer like the true desert hacker he is.

In the desert, a pick-up is seen from the back, parked next to a concrete small building, with a camera installation on top. A man in bright clothing and a hat is standing on the back of the pickup, facing the camera, with his hands on a keyboard and his eyes on a screen, both plugged in at the camera installation. Also, a desk with some electronic equipment, tapes and cables is seen in the foreground.

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Matthias M. M. Meier @matthiasmmmeier.com · 05/02/2025

After picking up some supplies, we drove to Saih Rawl. On the roof of a building there, we find the first of several allsky cameras (part of the global fireball network, gfo.rocks) we want to service on this trip. Beda Hofmann, Anna Zappatini and Urs Eggenberger, all from NHM Bern, are seen here.

Three people standing on the roof of a building under a bright sky, contemplating a technical installation at the center of the image.

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Matthias M. M. Meier @matthiasmmmeier.com · 05/02/2025

I arrived in Oman on Tuesday morning, united with the rest of the group, and we immediately left for the south, crossing through what geologists know as the Omani ophiolithe, a giant piece of seafloor basalts and carbonates that were thrusted onto the continental crust in this region.

A view of the coastal mountain range of Oman, with brown, bare, rocky peaks in the back, gravel and some green bushes in the foreground.

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Matthias M. M. Meier @matthiasmmmeier.com · 12/12/2024

Give me a single image from a film that immediately makes you hear the song from the soundtrack in your head.

It is dark in Tolkiens Middle Earth. After discovering that the wizard Saruman killed many trees for his Orc factory at Isengard, the Ents attack the factory. Many ents are seen steping over the charred ground, one of them, in the image center, called Treebeard, carries two Hobbits.

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Matthias M. M. Meier @matthiasmmmeier.com · 12/11/2024

Got some fresh, cool mountain air today. Aescher, Canton of Appenzell Innerrhoden, Switzerland.

The Aescher, a hut/small mountain restaurant made with wood, sits cuddled to the base of a steep, overhanging rock wall on the right hand side. A grass-covered slope with some snow on it lies underneath it. A narrow trail in the foreground, with some guardrails, leads to the hut. The sky, only visible on the left hand side, is cloudy/foggy.

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Matthias M. M. Meier @matthiasmmmeier.com · 28/10/2024

If you see this, post a picture taken in the mountains. The Aletsch glacier near Riederfurka, canton of Valais, Switzerland.

A glacier winds its way in the middle of a barren, rocky valley, with snow-capped peaks in the distance under a slightly cloudy sky. In front of it, a forested mountain flank sets a contrast to glacier and mountains with various greens.

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Matthias M. M. Meier @matthiasmmmeier.com · 29/09/2024

If you wonder what the Blinna looks like - this is it. 😉

A wild mountain river in its bed full of boulders of different sizes, with snow-capped mountains in the distance.

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Matthias M. M. Meier @matthiasmmmeier.com · 29/09/2024

Valley of the Blinna, canton of Valais, Switzerland, today.

A field of pink flowers along a path in a valley, which leads to snow-capped mountains in the distance. The flanks of the valley are coverd in dark green forests.

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Matthias M. M. Meier @matthiasmmmeier.com · 30/08/2024

A landscape shaped by microorganisms, water, ice - and humans.

In the Swiss mountains, a modern terminus station of a cable car overviews the valley below. Under its foundations, the mountain is composed of layered calcite rocks.

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Matthias M. M. Meier @matthiasmmmeier.com · 25/08/2024

Here we go again... Like if you know it, repost if you are still playing it... (like me, from time to time) 🚀

A screenshot from the overview screen of a legacy space strategy game.

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Matthias M. M. Meier @matthiasmmmeier.com · 16/08/2024

post a non religious picture u think of as holy

An image of the the Earth, taken by the Voyager space probe, from very far away. The Earth is thus only a pale blue dot in darkness, except for some image artifacts, including a "beam of light" in which that pale blue dot seems to be suspended.

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Matthias M. M. Meier @matthiasmmmeier.com · 02/07/2024

Wenn der Museumsbesuch zu kurz war...

Eine Fledermaus-Schnittschablone, die zu einem Drittel ausgemalt ist - im leeren Feld steht: "sorry, muste gehen :)".

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Matthias M. M. Meier @matthiasmmmeier.com · 21/06/2024

Great discussion in front of a big audience, on 19th of June in St. Gallen, Switzerland. Astrophysicist Thomas Zurbuchen (@drthomasz.bsky.social) is interviewed by philosopher Barbara Bleisch on a range of topics on humanity and the universe. Thank you both for a wonderful evening! (image: J. Seitz)

Astrophysicist Thomas Zurbuchen and philosopher Barbara Bleisch sitting together and discussing, laughing, on a podium in St. Gallen, Switzerland. In the background, a title image says "Mensch & Universum" (Humanity & Universe).

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Matthias M. M. Meier @matthiasmmmeier.com · 21/06/2024

Look at this beauty I bought (from JNMC) for the new #meteorite exhibit yesterday: the troilite inclusions contain small graphite grains, which are clustered at one end due to the local gravity on (or rather, in!) the meteorites' parent asteroid. A piece of the Cape York meteorite, Agpalilik mass.

A large (ca. 20 x 12 cm) cut piece of an iron meteorite, with the Widmanstätten pattern visible, containing also three large, elongated troilite inclusions.

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Matthias M. M. Meier @matthiasmmmeier.com · 03/06/2024

Wow. So much for "bland geology" on Mars. There are so many stories on that little red planet - once we send humans there who can tell them.

A view of the surface of Mars, showing several boulders of different sizes with visibly different geology: bright ones, dark ones, bland ones, spotted ones, rounded ones, angular ones, even a rock with a slightly pink hue.

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Matthias M. M. Meier @matthiasmmmeier.com · 26/05/2024

In front of the Alpstein, today. We do have cows in Switzerland, did you know that?

A group of three cows standing in the grass, with yellow flowers in the foreground and mountains in the background.

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Matthias M. M. Meier @matthiasmmmeier.com · 01/05/2024

The first thing you see after you die.

A view from inside a cave. The entrance is not directly visible but its approximate direction is given by the sunlight reflecting off the cave walls. A large, moss-covered rock is also visible.

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Matthias M. M. Meier @matthiasmmmeier.com · 12/04/2024

Interestingly, as pointed out by David Kipping at the other place, for the first exomoon candidate Kepler-1625b-i, this is also true: from its planet, the star subtends the same angle as the moon (both are about twice as big as the Moon/Sun from Earth).

Tweet by David Kipping: "The Moon is ~400x smaller than the Sun but ~400x further away => same angular diameter (0.5°) - which is why #TotalEclipse2024 happens! Interestingly, fort he exomoon candidate K1625b-i, this is also true! From K1625b, star is (0.93+-0.01)° and K1625b-i is (0.95+-0.17)°. To scale: (Picture showing Earth/Moon and Kepler-1625b / Kepler-1625b-i systems, and actual size comparison)

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Matthias M. M. Meier @matthiasmmmeier.com · 28/03/2024

Two years ago, my family and I found a dead young carrion crow under a tree, close to the city center of St. Gallen. Today, thanks to our incredibly skilled taxidermist Lorenzo Vinciguerra, this black beauty started a new life as taxidermy mount Nr. 8601.

Taxidermy mount of a beautiful black carrion crow

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Matthias M. M. Meier @matthiasmmmeier.com · 29/02/2024

One of the reasons is the high delta-v (read as: fuel) required to get to Mercury. If you add up all the numbers in the figure below, you get a total of 16 km/s - almost twice the delta-v required to reach Earth orbit! Flybys can reduce that, but add time. So simply getting there is really hard.

A delta-v map of the solar system, styled a "subway map", showing the amount of delta-v (in meters per second) necessary to reach different destinations, orbits and surfaces throughout the solar system.

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Matthias M. M. Meier @matthiasmmmeier.com · 27/02/2024

I think Mercury gets too little love as a site for a future human settlement. It has martian gravity, abundant sun-light for energy and volatiles at the poles. Most importantly, due to very low axis tilt, the ground temp. varies with latitude - at the right latitude, 295 K ground temp. is possible!

A photograph of an almost full-phase Mercury, made by the MESSENGER space probe in 2008.

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Matthias M. M. Meier @matthiasmmmeier.com · 22/02/2024

Illustrations or "artist impressions" of red dwarf "Earths" should always be taken with a grain of salt.

Artist impressions of the nearest, "potentially habitable" worlds, showing deserts, clouds, oceans on several of the planets.

A hypothetical scene on a planet orbiting a red dwarf star, with another couple of red dwarf stars nearby.

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Matthias M. M. Meier @matthiasmmmeier.com · 21/02/2024

See Connerney et al., 2005: doi.org/10.1073/pnas...

Map of the magnetic field of Mars observed by the MGS satellite at a nominal 400-km altitude (from Connerney et al., 2005)

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Matthias M. M. Meier @matthiasmmmeier.com · 13/02/2024

Ha, finally got mine. Yeah, seems right, although I am a bit surprised about the prominence of "asteroid"...

Research word cloud for Matthias M. M. Meier, the most prominent words being meteorite, asteroid, exposure, noble, grains, cosmic and age.

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