The Power of using Infographics to Communicate Science

The best Americaninfographics of 2013

“We find ourselves in the era of big data, a time when information moves faster than ever, and infographics

provide us with quick, often influential bursts of insight and knowledge. They are a mesmerizing new way of

seeing and understanding our world”, says Gareth Cook, Pulitzer Prize-winning science journalist and series

editor of the Best American Infographics.

In Cook’s latest book, Best American Infographics 2013, a melange of examples show the different ways

infographics can be used to portray data, statistics, facts, information and reports effectively. Those

featured range from mapping ocean noise and New York’s carbon emissions, to gun ownership rates by

country and the anatomy of speed.

Increasingly in science, infographics are being used to break down and simplify complex messages. “Science

is a field where infographics are particularly useful and powerful, because there is so much drama, but it’s

often hidden from human eyes or difficult to comprehend, says Cook. “Our quest to understand space is a

great example of this – with distances and forces so large it’s hard for the average person to make sense of

what has been discovered. What is it like to land on Mars? How alone are we in the Milky Way, truly? These

are questions that demand visual answers.”

Infographics from Nature and Scientific American featured in Cook’s end-of-year book, both coincidentally

focused on space.

In this blog, the art teams at Nature and Scientific American (both part of Nature Publishing Group) reflect

on the power and importance of using infographics to communicate science.

Kelly Krause, art director at Nature, talks through the thinking behind the ‘7 Minutes from Terror’

infographic.

“The graphic was created as a visual guide to NASA’s Curiosity rover landing on Mars in August 2012,

counting down from guided entry into the atmosphere, illustrating key events and details along the way.

Nature’s audience is predominantly scientists, so the graphic is heavy on precise measurements — such as

altitude and velocity at specific moments—while at the same time giving an overall context for the mission

by using step-by-step illustrations on a map of the landing site, and also compares key details with previous

missions to Mars.

A visual guide to NASA’s Curiosity rover landing on Mars in August 2012

“NASA missions continue to amaze and inspire, so the editorial decision to feature the Curiosity landing as

a two-page infographic was popular from the start. The whole graphic took just over a week to complete,

with Eric Hand, chief of correspondents, in Washington providing excellent reporting rich in detail for the

art team to digest.

“We began with gorgeous source illustrations from NASA—this allowed us to spend more time on

information design, which I think is the real triumph of this piece. There is an amazing amount of

information on these two pages, but it all comes together seamlessly, thanks to assistant art editor Jasiek

Krzysztofiak’s simple but effective illustration of the landing as a central element, with events and other

details arranged around the perimeter. This piece also benefits from a consistent key (time, altitude,

velocity) that runs through the events, and a disciplined design (such as, each NASA spot image appears in a

circle, consistent typography, and a good text to image ratio).

“Our biggest challenge was legibility of type, and some might argue that reverse type is difficult to read.

There are compromises to be made in almost every complex graphic. In this case, we felt that mentally

transporting the audience to Mars, with the aid of Martian sky and soil background, was an opportunity not

to be missed, so we worked hard to place text in areas without too much background detail.”

Similarly Jen Christiansen, art director of information graphics at Scientific American, believes

infographics in science are an engaging way to appeal to a wide and non-specialist audience.

Here she explains the idea behind the graphic by Jan Willem Tulp entitled ‘Planets Everywhere’.

Jan Willem Tulp visualises exoplanet discoveries.

“In the midst of a few particularly neat exoplanet discoveries just over a year ago, the time seemed right for

Scientific American to develop a stand-alone graphic on the topic for our ‘Graphic Science’ page. Editor

John Matson tracked down the data set, and I reached out to freelance data visualizer Jan Willem Tulp, to

see if he was up for the project.

“For the final form, Tulp took inspiration from a few classic genres—sky maps and star charts. By splitting

the view into two hemispheres, and including a few benchmarks (one well-known constellation in each

hemisphere), he provides the reader with a comfortable and evocative framework within which to explore

the less-familiar exoplanet data.”

Summing up the effective use of infographics in science, Christiansen says, “Graphics can often

communicate scientific concepts more efficiently than words, for any audience. Visuals that are developed

for a science savvy but non-specialist audience, like this one above, can help make scientific findings

accessible to broader audiences. By removing barriers (such as technical jargon), and providing context (in

this case, the two constellations), the information is presented in an immediately intuitive and engaging

manner.”

To hear Gareth Cook and neuroscientist Stephen Kosslyn talk about how to be a savvier infographics reader,

and how to spot graphics that mislead, listen here on Science Friday.