Claude Debussy's 151st Birthday

Today, Google celebrates the 151st birthday of Achille-Claude Debussy, a prominent French composer who played a vital role in the Western music's transition to the modern era, with a motion picture clip of a riverside scenery and one of his most popular piece, Clair de Lune, playing in the background.

Happy Chinese Valentine's Day 2013

Now here's an interactive app doodle made by Google to celebrate a Chinese festival called Qixi Festival.

The origins of this celebration, which falls on the seventh day of the 7th lunar month, is from a mythical folktale about two lovers, the cowherd and weaver girl, whose love was not meant to be and were banished to opposite sides of the Universe only to meet once a year via a bridge formed by a flock of magpies.

Erwin Schrödinger's 126th Birthday

Today's Google doodle features two drawings of presumably the same cat, alive and well coming out from one side of a box and being in spirit form or rather dead flying out from the other side of the box. And if we top this up with the scribbling of what seems to be some mathematical equation into the doodle, then there can be only one thing that comes into mind...

Yup, the infamously "cruel" (I'm joking here of course) thought experiment of Erwin Schrödinger (Schrödinger's cat).

So needless to say, this doodle is made to celebrate the 126th birthday of Erwin Schrödinger, a world renown Austrian physicist who developed a number of fundamental results in the field of quantum theory, which ultimately formed the basis of wave mechanics.

But despite being only largely known for his contributions in the quantum field, he does have many works in various other fields of physics, in philosophy and in theoretical biology as well, so he's quite the heck of a guy in my opinion.

Rosalind Franklin's 93rd Birthday

Today's Google spotlight features the doodle of a famous British biophysicist and X-ray crystallographer, Rosalind Elsie Franklin. She was most noted for her contributions into our understanding of the fine molecular structures of coal, graphite, DNA, RNA and viruses.

Rembrandt van Rijn's 407th Birthday

The doodle found on Google's homepage today celebrates the 407th birthday of Rembrandt Harmenszoon van Rijn, a Dutch painter and etcher who was generally considered to be an important figure in the European art and Dutch history. However, despite being hailed as such, it seems that his life was sort of a downhill ride whereby the height of his success was during his youthful days and things just went downwards ever since.

Li Shizhen's 495th Birthday

Today is the 495th birthday of Li Shizhen, reputed to be one of the greatest Chinese doctors in history.

His most important contribution was in writing the Compendium of Materia Medica which he took 27 years to complete. In this medical text features 1,892 entries, detailing more than 1,800 drugs or items believed to have medicinal properties (like plants, animals and minerals), 1,100 illustrations and 11,000 prescriptions.

Although not all of its information is scientifically correct (some have been proven to be erroneous due to the contemporary limited scientific and technical knowledge of those times), it still remains as a premier reference work for herbal medicines, has been translated into more than 20 languages and contains information valuable to a wide variety of subjects such as botany, zoology, mineralogy and metallurgy.

2013 Tour de France

Following the 2013 Tour de France that is happening from 29th June 2013 to 21st July 2013, Google has made the above doodle to commemorate it (as it will be the 100th one).

Anyway, the Tour de France, is an annual multiple stage bicycle race that is held primarily in France but may occasionally pass through nearby countries.

With the first ever race being initially organized (in 1903) to increase the paper sales for the magazine L'Auto, its pretty amazing in my opinion that it has lasted for over a century (and I'm sure there will be many more to come).

Antoni Gaudi's 161st Birthday

Today's Google doodle celebrates the 161st birthday of Antoni Gaudí i Cornet, a Spanish architect who was skilled in a good series of crafts such as ceramics, stained glass, wrought ironwork forging and carpentry. But not only that, he was most noted for his talent in integrating all that he had learnt into his architectural works, eventually earning him the nickname of "God's Architect" as well as being beatified.

Father's Day 2013

Celebrating Father's Day 2013, Google especially created this slots-like mix-n-match doodle, matching various sorts of male cartoonish heads, bodies and legs to create interesting-looking fathers.

Happy Dragon Boat Festival 2013

Today we have Google's own version of a dragon boat to celebrate a Chinese traditional festival, called DuanWu Jie (Duanwu Festival).

Though there are a couple of folk traditions and myths with their own interpretation to the origins of this festival, the most predominant one would be that of Qu Yuan who drowned himself in a river and people throwing rice dumplings (zongzi) into the river to feed the fish so that they would not eat his body.

Maurice Sendak's 85th Birthday

Today, the doodle shown on Google's homepage features an animated clip of creatures, characters and settings. Apparently, these beings and scenes were first given their forms and lives through the hands of a talented American illustrator and writer of children's books, Maurice Bernard Sendak.

Mother's Day 2013

On this second Sunday of May 2013, in honor of all mothers around the world, Google has made this interesting app doodle. Apparently, the contraption featured in this app seems to be some sort of Mother's Day Giftcreatinator.

At each of the various stages in the gift-making process, the user has the freedom to choose one of the three available options to input into the device. And at the end of it all, a special Mother's Day card would pop out depending on the user's prior inputs. Interesting, ain't it?

Saul Bass' 93rd Birthday

On today's Google homepage features a short Youtube video made to commemorate Saul Bass, an American graphic designer and filmmaker, best known for his design of motion picture title sequences, film posters and corporate logos.

Amongst his most prominent works include the animated paper cut-out of a heroin addict's arm (Preminger's The Man with the Golden Arm), the opening-credits sequence in Hitchcock's North by Northwest, designing of AT&T's "bell" logo in 1969 and "globe" logo in 1983, Continental Airlines' 1968 "jetstream" logo as well as United Airlines' 1974 "tulip" logo.

Malaysia GE-13

Today's Google doodle is a very special one drawn to commemorate Malaysia's GE-13. I believe most of us woke up early in the morning and went to line up at the polling stations at least 30 minutes before it had started. And now that we had done our part...the rest is up for the nation to speak for itself (in a matter of hours).

Labour Day 2013

The 2013 Labour Day doodle shows a simple drawing depicting an office worker, an orchardist, a paint worker and a construction worker all lumped together into one picture. To me, although it looks simpler, it does "paint" a more encompassing scene in contrast to the 2012's.

So compared to the 2012 Labour Day doodle, which do you like better?

Ella Fitzgerald's 96th Birthday

Ella Fitzgerald was an American jazz vocalist with an incredible vocal range. She was noted for her purity of tone, impeccable diction, phrasing and intonation, and a "horn-like" improvisational ability, particularly in her scat singing (as according to Wikipedia).

Earth Day 2013

Earth Day 2013's doodle features an interactive app that takes you through the seasons of nature...which in my opinion is far more interesting than the static floral one shown on Earth Day 2012.

Leonhard Euler's 306th Birthday

Leonhard Euler, born on the 15th April 1707, was a Swiss mathematician and physicist who made many important discoveries which were vital in the fields of mathematics and physics. His notable works include the introduction of modern mathematical terminology and notation, as well as his contributions in mechanics, fluid dynamics, optics and astronomy.

Maria Sibylla Merian's 366th Birthday

Today's Google doodle features detailed illustrations of some insects, caterpillars, butterflies and oddly enough, an iguana or some lizard-like entity as well.

It is apparently created to celebrate the 366th birthday of a German naturalist and scientific illustrator, Maria Sibylla Merian. She was known for her detailed observations and documentation of butterfly metamorphosis.

Douglas Adams' 61st Birthday

Today's Google doodle is actually dedicated to Douglas Adams, an English writer who is best known for writing The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy.