Today I found out how flies land on the ceiling. A popular notion of how they accomplished this used to be that the flies would do a half barrel roll sideways just before landing on the ceiling and then let their momentum carry them the rest of the way up. This was shown to be incorrect when, in 1958, Natural […]
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Today I found out South African earthworms can grow as large as 22 feet long, with the average length being about 6 feet long. The largest one ever found so far, being 22 feet long, was found on a road side in 1967. Other varieties of large earthworms include the Giant Gippsland earthworm of Australia, which grows about 3 feet […]
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Today I found out the human gut contains about 100 trillion bacterial cells, about 10 times as many cells as make up the human body. The human gut is basically sterile until you are born. For the first year of your life, the cultures of bacteria and other microbes in your gut fluctuate wildly and begin settling down around the […]
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Today I found out that the “S.O.S” in S.O.S brand scrub pads stands for “Save Our Saucepans”. The name was originally thought up by the wife of the creator of the S.O.S pad, Ed Cox. In 1917, Cox was an aluminum pot salesman. When Cox would introduce himself to potential new customers, he would give them a little steel wool […]
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Today I found out that Ada Lovelace was the world’s first computer programmer all the way back in the mid-1800s, writing the world’s first computer program in 1842. She was also an accomplished mathematician, which was obviously quite rare for women in the era she lived. Lovelace was the only legitimate daughter of Lord Byron, though she never knew him […]
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Myth: Any big surge of water from the oceans is called a tidal wave; the terms “Tsunami” and “Tidal Waves” mean the same and are interchangeable. Tsunamis are mistakenly called tidal waves because, when approaching land, they look as a tide which suddenly rushes away and crashes back in a form of a huge wave. It is true that both […]
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Today I found out what causes the “sleep” or “eye crusties” you may have around your eyes in the morning. “Sleep” is a type of “rheum”, which is the name for discharge from your nose, mouth or eyes during sleep. More specifically, eye rheum is known as “gound”. Gound is made up of a mixture of dust, blood cells, skin […]
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Today I found out why spicy foods can cause your nose to run. In most spicy foods, this is thanks to the same chemicals that cause the burning sensation on your tongue, namely capsaicin or allyl isothiocyanate. Capsaicin is chemical found in fruits of the genus Capsicum, which includes peppers. It is present, usually in relatively high amounts, in the […]
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Today I found out why red meat turns brown when cooked. This is thanks to a protein called myoglobin, which also is what makes the raw red meat look red, not blood, as many people think. Myoglobin is a protein that stores oxygen in muscle cells, very similar to its cousin, hemoglobin, which stores oxygen in red blood cells. This […]
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Myth: Bats are blind The saying “blind as a bat”, simply isn’t correct. The truth is that all 1,100 bat species can see and often their vision is pretty good, although not as excellent as many other night-hunting animals. There are two main groups of bats, which are believed to have evolved independently of each other, but both from a […]
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Today I found out how anti-static dryer sheets work. There are two primary methods used to get rid of static charge buildup in drying clothing, which happily go hand in hand with one another using the same substance. The first method is to lubricate the clothing. The second method is to use a positively charged material to more or less […]
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Today I found out what the “PEZ” in “PEZ Dispenser” stands for. PEZ started out as a peppermint breath mint company in Vienna, Austria in 1927. The name PEZ derives from this fact. Specifically, “PEZ” comes from the German word for peppermint, “pfefferminz”, with the “p” coming from the first letter of the word; the “e” is from the sixth […]
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Today I found out why chocolate is bad for dogs. Chocolate contains an alkaloid called “theobromine”. Theobromine is in the same family as caffeine and is a type of stimulant (they both are mythylxanines). Theobromine stimulates the central nervous system, cardiovascular system, and causes a slightly increases blood pressure. Dogs and certain other animals, such as horses and cats, cannot […]
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Today I found out Weird Al Yankovic was the valedictorian of his class at Lynwood High School, which is just outside of Los Angeles. In addition to this, he graduated high school at just 16 years old. He was able to do so because his parents had him attend kindergarten a year earlier than is typical. After performing well academically […]
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Today I found out that the astronauts and cosmonauts on the International Space Station witness around 15 sunrises and 15 sunsets every day. The International Space Station orbits about 354 kilometers (220 miles) above the Earth and travels at approximately 27,700 km/hr (17,211 mph), so it takes about 92 minutes to circle the Earth once. For this reason, every 45 […]
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Today I found out the difference between discrete and discreet. Simply put, “discreet” describes showing “reserve, prudence, or cautiousness” in one’s behavior or speech. “Discrete”, on the other hand, means “distinct, separate, or unrelated”. A quick and easy mnemonic to remember the difference is to see that in “discrete”, unlike “discreet”, the “e’s” are separated and the definition itself is […]
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Today I found out what nougat is made of. There are three main types of nougat: white nougat; brown nougat; and German nougat. White nougat is made primarily from whipping egg whites, sugar, nuts (usually almonds, pistachios, or hazelnuts), and honey together. Brown nougat is made in a very similar fashion as white nougat, except generally without the egg whites […]
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Today I found out why championship football games are called “bowls”. In 1901, the Roses Association sponsored a college Tournament East-West football game between Michigan and Stanford. In this game, Stanford quit in the third quarter, being down 49-0. For the next 15 years, this annual event stopped featuring football, rather featured other events such as chariot racing. However, in […]
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