MinuteEarth is a series of short illustrated stories about science and our awesome planet!
Alex is a man of many hats at MinuteEarth – he writes, edits, Facebooks, Tweets, and crunches data for us. He also wears a lot of actual hats, since he lives in chilly Minnesota and has spent serious time traveling the Arctic. Even his stick figure sports a hat! And if there were a hat for sustainability, he’d wear it - he’s our go-to guy for all things food, and agriculture, and climate change.
Somewhere in the Mediterranean night, Arcadi is awake, spreading joy and science through his Spanish-language YouTube channel and podcast. Or maybe he’s cooking or playing video games. Or rewatching RuPaul’s Drag Race. Or maybe he’s being very silly on late-night Spanish Twitter. Or - most likely - he’s attempting to insert yet another deep cut pop culture Easter Egg into the latest MinuteEarth video he’s illustrating.
When Cameron isn’t lecturing college students about science or running all-night trail races through the hills of Colorado, you can find him in his home recording studio, waxing philosophically about bird songs, or hobbits, or intricate pop-culture-based metaphors for various aspects of evolutionary theory.
Like most superheroes, David leads a double life. By day he is a writer and business guru for MinuteEarth, but by Twitter he becomes ‘Mr. Puntastic’ - making the world laugh (and groan) one pun at a time. He’s also our animal behavior expert – especially of the primate variety. David traveled the world researching our jungle cousins and working with conservation organizations before settling down to raise a few primates of his own. Luckily for us, when it comes to making a great video (or a great pun), he doesn’t monkey around…
Ever is a math lover at heart; before joining MinuteEarth he was a math teacher and gets carried away with any video that has math references or math in fancy after effects animations. He’s also our resident translations, internet culture, and cuteness expert (being Venezuelan helps with at least one of these). When he’s not working on MinuteEarth – and maybe sometimes while he is – he spends his time thinking about pokemon, playing Zelda, making platonic solids and hyperbolic surfaces in origami, eating baby food, and watching Game of Thrones.
Henry is the collection of atoms behind MinutePhysics. He is a trained physicist who excels at using stick figures, visual effects and puns to explain complicated concepts. He’s very knowledgeable and loves science, music, cold winters, cross-country skiing and running. He also speaks Parseltongue with his three adorable pet snakes.
When he’s not swing dancing or mountain biking, Jasper runs MinuteLabs, the web home for all of MinuteEarth’s and MinutePhysics’ interactive projects. How does Jasper manage to do everything? Easy - his creations are powered by JavaScript, and his frenetic pace is powered by (annoyingly good) coffee.
Kate rides horses into the sunset in the US southwest. She has a Ph.D. in hyenas and takes care of a menagerie of animals, including a Griffin. Unsurprisingly, she is responsible for many of our animal-themed videos, and she also has a hand in most everything else as an editor, director, and herder of cats, trying to keep the rest of us on schedule.
Born and raised in Brazil, Leo has always had a passion for making science interesting and accessible - that’s how he got started making the Portuguese version of MinuteEarth, Minuto da Terra. From there, he’s helped to launch multiple other language versions of MinuteEarth, along with creating all sorts of short MinuteEarth content. When he is not translating, recording and editing, you can find him doing other interesting stuff like talking to plants, cooking or enjoying the outdoors - anywhere in the world. Tchau!
Lizah isn’t your ordinary, run-of-the-mill microbiology-PhD-turned-science-illustrator. Instead, this Dutch phenom’s work is just as likely to appear on a science-themed drag show or a D&D Twitch stream as it is to show up in the cover of an academic journal or, you know, a certain beloved YouTube channel.
Melissa has a thing for bees. Her family runs a bee farm. She likes to make art out of layers of their wax. Even her daughter is named Bea (ok, Beatrice). So when it comes to MinuteEarth, it’s no surprise that the park ranger-turned-lawyer also minds all of our beeswax. By managing our legal and business affairs, she turns our swarm of chaos into a thriving hive.
Nathaniel’s colorful voice is in every single MinuteEarth video. You’ll hear it as guitar and bass strings vibrating along with other musical - and magical - sounds. He does music for MinutePhysics too, so if you have been around on Youtube for a while, you have probably listened to his tracks at some point.
Peter is MinuteEarth’s green thumb – he even grew two members of the MinuteEarth team! And after watching Henry blossom from a creator of Lord of the Rings spoofs (circa 2005) into a creator of excellent science videos (circa 2011), Peter had the germ of an idea for a more Earth-focused version of MinutePhysics. That idea grew roots and eventually sprouted into MinuteEarth. Today, when he’s not overseeing massive experiments at the University of Minnesota, Peter digs into his vast expertise and harvests video ideas on forest ecology and global change.
The next time you’re wandering in the woods in the American Northeast, look out for Sarah, who gains inspiration by spending her time staring at - and sketching - the trees. In addition to being a natural history illustrator, Sarah’s also a photographer, folk harpist, calligraphist, and whatever-new-crafts-she-can-get-her-hands-on-ist. And late at night, when it’s too dark to enjoy branches and leaves outdoors, you’ll probably find her watching old school Vines.