Data are the currency of scientists, but it is always a challenge to present data in ways that allow their stories to emerge. When you find a data visualization that really makes the story come alive, it can be exciting, both as a researcher and as a teacher. An ecologist for the Wildlife Conservation Society, who himself is quite good at allowing data to tell stories, posted a link on Twitter to this visualization of ocean plastics:

http://app.dumpark.com/seas-of-plastic-2/#

It tells the story of 5.25 trillion pieces of plastic that currently inhabit the oceans. It’s worth a look. The data come from some work by Eriksen et al. 2014 that can be found here:

http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0111913

I haven’t had a chance to read it yet, but will post something about it when I get a chance.