The still life on the cover of this week’s issue of Science is not a photograph but a computer-generated rendering of five famous mathematical surfaces. The result, created by Richard Palais of the University of California, Irvine, and graphic artist Luc Benard, is a virtuoso display of modern computer-graphics technology. (Notice how the glassy surfaces are reflected in one another and in the glass-covered, wood-grained tabletop.)
The image is the first-place winner in the illustration category of the 2006 Science and Engineering Visualization Challenge
The links on this page will take you to articles describing the accomplishments of the creative and gifted scientists, artists, and others who put the winning entries together, as well as an online slide presentation that showcases the competition’s winners and honorable mentions.