Heavenly Helices

A fractal is a self-similar pattern. It’s what you get when you take a shape and repeat it indefinitely at increasingly smaller scales. Paradoxically, fractal geometry allows closed surfaces with infinite area, and this explains how the surface area of your lungs is approximately that of a tennis court. The intricacy of the fractals I produce requires a computer, but fractals exist throughout nature in the form of peacock feathers, ferns, leaves, arteries, tree branches, broccoli (pictured), pineapples, crystals, snowflakes, sea urchins, nautilus shells, stalactites, canyons, mountains, waterfalls, rivers, shorelines, lightning, rain, and even clouds.