Animations of unseeable biology | Drew Berry | TED
Why Hacker News recommends it
HN recommends it for mind-blowing visuals that make cell biology tangible.
What it is
Drew Berry shows scientifically accurate animations of molecular processes inside cells, such as DNA replication, at TEDxSydney.
Recommended by 7 HN commenters across 7 different months, 2017 to 2025.
What Hacker News said
Strong rec joering2 · 2017-10 · on “No human genome has ever been completely sequenced”
Slightly off-topic, but this semi-animation of DNA replication machine that is working right now in your body (in amounts of trillions of devices) blew my mind few months ago. from TED: [this video]
Strong rec benjismith · 2024-02 · on “Rendering protein structures inside cells at the atomic level with Unreal Engine”
This reminds me of the amazing molecular animations of Drew Berry, which he showed in this TED talk: [this video] Which was 12 years ago! After watching that video, I had a much greater appreciation for how our bodies are made up of trillions of tiny protein machines. Fascinating stuff!!
Recommends nol13 · 2017-02 · on “Why Do DMT Users See Insects from a Parallel Universe?”
[this video] ^My favorite way I've seen it described, and also a really cool video even without the subtext. (but ya this is one rabbit hole that I've yet to travel down. guess i took the blue pill, but more pills just seemed unnecessary at the time)
Recommends nom · 2017-06 · on “Close-Up View of DNA Replication”
If you liked this video, also check out this one: Inner Life of the Cell [LINK] And here's a nice TED talk by Drew Berry: Animations of unseeable biology [this video] These kind of visualizations are of course an idealized view on how it works. As others have already mentioned, the processes are hugely chaotic and much more probabilistic than deterministic. On this scale everything is just one huge wobbling soup of things crashing into each other, which makes it even more fascinating that it works as well as it does.
Recommends discrisknbisque · 2018-05 · on “The life cycle of HIV in 3D [video]”
Drew Berry creates similar animations and refers to them (in this talk) as "accurate representations", but doesn't go into much detail. Interesting history in the beginning as well. [this video]
Recommends Darkskynet · 2022-08 · on “Ask HN: Boring but important tech no one is working on?”
On the topic of 'scientifically accurate animations of biological processes'. You may know of these videos, but I thought these might be worth sharing for others interested in this topic: Here is a TEDTalk by Drew Berry: Animations of unseeable biology. (uploaded in 2012) [this video] Here is also a more recent video by Veritasium on YT that also talks about these animations. (uploaded in 2017) [LINK]
Recommends Zealotux · 2025-07 · on “Super-resolution microscopes reveal new details of cells and disease”
Sorry for being a bit off-topic. Biology wasn't my forte in high school, I wish I had read this article back then [LINK] and seen that video (9:08 min) [this video]