Science

The technology in a fax machine is pretty simple. A bright light reflects off the document as it passes along a strip containing hundreds of tiny photocells. If a white area of the page passes below, the photocells convert the light shining off the document into electricity. If the area is black, the photocell generates … Read more

The first computer mouse was invented by Douglas Engelbart in the early 1960s. Douglas Engelbart was Director of the Stanford Research Institute’s Augmentation Research Center, located in Menlo Park. The mouse has been widely used since the time of its introduction. It’s now the standard peripheral of all new computers. There are more than a … Read more

A bubble jet printer uses a principle as old as mud bubbling out of the ground. Have you ever noticed that when bubbles pop, a little of the liquid gets propelled outward? Sure you have, —think of the misty feeling you get when you put your nose up to ginger ale, or the stickiness that … Read more

Here’s how a laser printer works. Inside the printer is a large metal roller (the “photoreceptive drum”). As the drum rotates past an electrified wire (“the corona”), the surface gets a positive electrical charge in preparation for the laser beam. The beam is guided by the computer, of course, invisibly scanning the text and images … Read more

The joystick predates computers by decades. It has been a part of airplanes almost since their introduction—its first known reference dates back to 1914. An airplane joystick works much the same as with computer games—you pull or push it, or lean it to the side, to control direction of movement. Where did it get its … Read more

A lava lamp works on two principles: heat rises, and some liquids don’t mix. Waxy liquid shares a glass bottle with thin, watery liquid. The bottom of the metal base underneath the glass bottle holds a light. When you plug it in and turn it on, the light slowly heats up the contents of the … Read more

Polaroid photos are seemingly a magic trick, and in reality there is something of an illusion in the way it “develops before your eyes.” After you take an instant photo, it passes through two stainless-steel rollers, which spread chemicals that are collected in a blob at the edge of the plastic film sheet. These chemicals … Read more

It’s called Kirlian photography, and there is indeed something to it. However, it isn’t what its parapsychological proponents claim. The process is named after Semyon and Valentina Kirlian, a husband-and-wife team who first reported their findings in the Russian Journal of Scientific and Applied Photography in 1961. What they discovered was that if you put … Read more

When Francisco Goya’s work changed drastically from conventional portraits to dark and grotesque subjects, it was probably the result of lead poisoning. Through his mid-forties, Francisco Goya was not only a court painter but also well known for his tame and innocuous subjects. But all that changed when he was forty-six. In 1792 he contracted … Read more

Indian yellow was first introduced in the 1750s and quickly became a staple of every artist’s palette because of its rich yellow hue. To get the deep color, manufacturers fed mango leaves to cows, collected their urine, and made a concentrate from it. In 1908 officials decided that feeding large quantities of mangoes to cows … Read more

There were many patents for typewriter-like machines, but only in 1868 did Christopher Latham Sholes invent the first typewriter that was also practical to use. The Remington Arms Company began producing it in 1873. One of its biggest fans was writer/humorist Mark Twain. He called it “a curiosity-breeding little joker” and was one of the … Read more

Graphite is a rock—, a carbon compound that’s been used for writing since long before modern pencils were invented. But it was an eighteenth-century geologist—, Abraham Werner, —who named the stuff graphite, from the Greek word meaning “write.” Eventually, we figured out how to enclose the graphite in wood so our hands don’t get dirty … Read more

Seeing that pencil “leads” are made from graphite, the name doesn’t make much sense, does it? But there once was a time when people thought graphite was a type of lead, hence the name. Lead is extremely toxic to humans and pencils should not contain any lead, even in the wood or paint. This is … Read more

First of all, very few people are actually, clinically tone-deaf. It means they have a neurological condition that renders them totally unable to hear differences in pitch. People who are truly tone-deaf can’t even hear the pitch differences in speech, —for example, whether someone’s voice is going up when asking a question, or staying even … Read more

Middle C is vibrating at a rate of 261.625 hertz. The C above middle C is vibrating at 523.25. The C below middle C is vibrating at 130.8125. You may notice that the higher C is vibrating exactly twice as fast as middle C. The lower C is vibrating at half the speed. This rule … Read more

Loudness hurts the ear, but frequency doesn’t, even if it’s really annoying. Once it goes above a certain frequency, the human ear simply won’t hear it. Also, as you get older, you will lose hearing in more of the higher frequency range. This can also happen if you damage your hearing by subjecting your eardrums … Read more

When you put colored sugar granules in the top of a hot metal cup that has tiny holes in it, it’s a lot like how polyester fiber is made. The sugar melts, and when the cup rotates at a high speed, tiny threads of molten sugar come shooting out of the spinnerets (the little holes) … Read more

Given the fuzzy pajamas that babies are wont to wear, we’ve often thought that panels of Velcro around the house would be a great way to get them off the floor and out of the way. Unfortunately, the good people at Child Protective Services had other opinions. But an adult? Let’s consider David Letterman as … Read more

A Swiss engineer named George de Mestral invented Velcro. In 1948 he was walking through woods and fields with his dog, presumably yodeling into the mountains, when he got intrigued by cockleburs that were getting stuck to his pants and his dog’s coat. Being an engineer, he took some home, looked at them under a … Read more

Death Valley, California, is situated 282 feet below sea level, making it the lowest dry land in the United States.

Earthquake weather means different things to different people. Some people believe that long stretches of abnormally hot temperatures precede earthquakes. Others believe bouts of low humidity are good indicators. There are as many weather theories as there are weather patterns. The truth is that weather plays no apparent role at all in the shifting of … Read more

Gibraltar stands as the northern gateway to the Mediterranean Sea, and has historically been a much-coveted fortress for observing all the movement in and out of the area. Despite its history as an impenetrable fortress, the Rock of Gibraltar consists almost entirely of soft gray limestone with a touch of shale thrown in for good … Read more

Despite its name, catgut isn’t actually made from the guts of cats. It was originally derived from the intestines of sheep, which were dried and twisted into thin, strong strands. While catgut could be made from the intestines of cows and other animals, there’s no evidence that cats were ever its source. So why isn’t … Read more

There is a difference between kidney stones and gallstones. The “stones” that grow in each are related to what each organ does for the body. The gallbladder is a small sac that lies just below the liver. It holds bile that’s been produced by the liver, saving it until the stomach needs it to add … Read more

No, kidney stone jewelry is not made from kidney stones, but it can be pretty confusing. What’s called a kidney stone in the jewelry business is really nephrite or hematite. The stones have been historically used by crystal healers and others in “treating” problems with the kidney, hence the name kidney stone. That doesn’t mean, … Read more

Not a diagnosis per se, but there is a name for the condition. It’s called an epigastric sensation.

A regular, routine chest X ray gives you the equivalent of three days’ worth of background radiation, —the levels of radiation you receive naturally from the sun, Earth, and other celestial bodies over the course of three days. A full-body CAT scan gives you the equivalent of four years of background radiation. This means that … Read more

There’s so much genetic work going on, some of which is still secret, that it’s hard to really determine which one is the weirdest. As far as we’re concerned, one of them has to be the glow-in-the-dark mice that obtained this ability courtesy of glowing jellyfish DNA transplants. Another is the pig teeth that grew … Read more

Originally proposed by the Department of Energy in 1990, the Human Genome Project set out on a fifteen-year biological journey, to discover all of the human genes. By early in 2001, both a government group and a private group of scientists had done an initial rough draft of the human genome. As of this writing, … Read more

No, a genome is the DNA—, or all of the genes within an organism. The human genome projects aims to map the entire human genome so that we can better understand diseases such as cancer. Hopefully one of these days, this information can be used to cure cancer and solve many other medical mysteries.

A couple of pills are specifically used in the treatment of alcoholism. The latest one is naltrexone HC1 (brand name ReVia)—a pill that blocks the effects of opoids. Opoids are neurotransmitters that the brain releases when thrilled—and also when drinking. They bind to receptors in the brain, and are believed to cause the “high” that … Read more

After Anton van Leeuwenhoek invented his microscope in 1642, a colleague was using it to look at thinly sliced cork. He thought that the neat rows of squares looked like the living quarters of monks —”cells”— and so the name stuck.

While people had figured out long ago that sex produced babies, they hadn’t yet discovered spermatozoa. In fact, it wasn’t until the invention of the microscope that people even knew the little fellas existed. Anton van Leeuwenhoek, inventor of the microscope, became one of the first to see sperm, bacteria, and protozoa. However, he didn’t … Read more

Boiling water will kill most bacteria and viruses, including those that want to do you harm. However, if you’re looking for complete sterility, boiling temperatures won’t kill every type of microorganism. For example, heat-loving bacteria have been found swimming in superheated volcanic vents bubbling up from the ocean’s floor, in the hot springs of Yellowstone … Read more

There’s a big difference between homeopathy and holistic medicine. Homeopathy comes from the belief that bringing on a small amount of the symptoms that all you will make you well—, homeo means “similar” in Greek; pathos means “suffering.” Founded in the 1800s by a doctor named Samuel Hahnemann, the practice was born out of Hahnemann’s … Read more

Any amount of soot or smoke in your lungs and bloodstream can damage your health, regardless of the source or composition. It’s true, though, that some sources of smoke are worse than others. With about four thousand chemicals found in cigarette smoke, merely taking out the nicotine wouldn’t be enough to make a healthy cigarette. … Read more

If you smoke, you’re anywhere from twenty to thirty times more likely to die of lung cancer than a nonsmoker. And you are much more likely to die of heart disease or another lung disorder than a nonsmoker, too. Nicotine patch, anyone? Or just quit cold turkey, that works too.

The bacteria Clostridium botulnum is the deadliest toxin that occurs naturally. It’s the cause of botulism, the deadly food poisoning that is sometimes contracted from canned goods or meats. Strangely, it’s also a medication who have involuntary muscle spasms. In very small quantities, botulinal toxin causes local paralysis, easing painful and debilitating muscle contractions. A … Read more

Despite anecdotal stories of athletes healing faster and pushing harder as a result, science has been unable to definitely prove that using anabolic steroids actually increases performance. As a matter of fact, because steroids are psychologically addictive drugs, most doctors believe that at least some of the positive effects are in the users’ minds. Anabolic … Read more

We’re glad you asked about Incubator Babies, because the history behind the incubator is a little bizarre. When Alexandre Lion invented the baby incubator in 1891, it was in response to an alarming infant mortality rate in France. Lion built a device with a water boiler and a fan system that blew warm, filtered air … Read more

Long after the Ottomans, the Chinese, and the Byzantines had realized the finer points of anatomy and physiology, western Europe stayed stuck in an old paradigm they’d learned from the ancient Greeks. It went something like this: The body consists of the four humours (fluids): blood, yellow bile, phlegm, and black bile. For the body, … Read more

As with so many great events in history, the first words spoken over the phone came purely by accident. When Alexander Graham Bell spilled acid on his pants in his workroom, his shriek of pain and panic came through a system he was testing. In the next room, Thomas Watson heard Bell’s electronically transmitted voice … Read more

Alexander Graham Bell invented many things, including a man-carrying kite, a land-mine detector, the hydrofoil boat, takeoff and landing gear for the airplane, and the aileron, —a part of an airplane wing that moves and helps control rolling. He was also a co-founder of the National Geographic Society.

Tin-can telephones do work, actually. The concept is pretty basic: When a person places her mouth inside the opening of a can and talks, the sound from her voice vibrates against the bottom of the can. These vibrations travel down the string and make the bottom of the other person’s can vibrate, too, transmitting the … Read more

Yes. Basic common sense dictates that driving while mentally focused on a conversation slows down reaction time by as much as half a second. But why take our word for it? Here’s what a major study on the topic found: If you talk on a cell phone while driving, you’re four times more likely to … Read more

Maybe. Probably not. Scientists still aren’t completely sure if cell phones cause brain cancer. It’s fairly accepted that cell phones don’t cause cancer with short-term use, but since cell phones haven’t been around long enough to be considered “long term,” it’s too early to say for sure. That said, major studies in recent years indicate … Read more

Sun flares are massive explosions on the sun with enough force to burn through the upper layer of Earth’s protective atmosphere. The flares are magnetic, so Earth’s magnetic field is able to protect us from the huge amount of heat and energy. However, the flares can still manage to disrupt activity on Earth’s surface for … Read more

It depends on how the cats are blowing, daddy-o. (Oh, sorry—, we momentarily flashed back to our neo-Beatnik days.) Anyway, the groove on a compact disc isn’t exactly a groove in the same sense as what’s on a phonograph record. It’s more like a path of binary-coded bumps (which some people call “pits,” though that’s … Read more

Like sonar and radar, laser is an acronym for a phrase that is much longer. LASER stands for “light amplification by the stimulated emission of radiation.”

It depends. The old phonograph records spun at a constant speed (for example, 33 or 45 revolutions per minute). That made it easy to make a turntable to handle them, but it meant that the music recorded near the outside of the record had better sound than the music recorded on the inner grooves. A … Read more

It’s a challenge, all right. DVDs use similar material and manufacturing processes, but there are several differences. Part of the solution was making the bumps that carry data smaller and jamming them closer together, making the “groove” of a DVD 7.5 miles long, more than twice what you get on a CD. But wait, there’s … Read more

We can record on both sides of a DVD, they just usually choose not to. Manufacturers believe that consumers would rather have a colorful label printed on one side than have a two-sided disk with twice the capacity. Some releases, however, have discs that are 2 sided. Although they have been few and far between … Read more

The key, of course, is to get the satellite into an orbit that is exactly the same speed as Earth (one time around every twenty-four hours). A space region called the Clarke Belt, about 22,300 miles above the surface of the planet, is the place where you find a large number of broadcast, weather, and … Read more

A newspaper column said the first person to transmit voices by radio was a Canadian guy. Italian Guglielmo Marconi was the first to send wireless transmissions, but his broadcasts contained Morse code, not voices. We’re not saying that his accomplishment wasn’t a big deal—, by 1901, for the first time in history, messages could be … Read more

Bees use a bee dance to communicate and tell other bees where the flowers are. Here’s how it works. It’s a pattern they trace in a figure-eight shape, while wiggling periodically and flapping their wings. What tells the story is the speed of the bee, the direction the bee points, and the sounds the bee … Read more

Glowworms are lightning bugs (or fireflies, if you prefer) during their larval stage. Glowworms can be found in many parts of North America in the summer. The best time to see them is at night or in the evenings.

Lightning bugs, also known as flireflys, produce light through chemical reactions in little cells called photocytes, using a substance called luciferin. When the enzyme luciferase is also present, the substances oxidize, creating a lot of energy. A spark of light is caused when the substances settle back down again. It is still unclear why fireflies … Read more

Doctors prescribed maggots to help heal wounds during World War I. How did this happen? The doctors caring for war casualties noticed that some patients’ wounds healed quicker and were more resistant to infection than others. At closer look, they realized those patients had flies landing on their open sores and laying eggs. Before long, … Read more

Almost all of the ladybugs will go elsewhere after you release them in your garden or yard. If you have enough aphids for the ladybugs to eat to make it worth their while, about 5 to 10 percent will stay. It helps to have water readily available near where they are released—, some suggest watering … Read more

Some spiders do stick to their own webs. A spider’s web is constructed of two types of silk: “anchor” and “snare” threads. The anchor threads are used to construct the basic web; the snare threads are sticky and are used to trap insects. To get around the web, the spider uses the non sticky anchor … Read more

You can die from a black widow spider bite, but most people who have been bitten don’t. Although a female black widow is not particularly aggressive (and the males are harmless), she will bite in self-defense and is quite poisonous. The effect of her bite is painful and frightening, and there isn’t much that can … Read more

A black widow spider bite starts with a stinging pinprick at the location. Dull numbing pain soon follows, often accompanied by some swelling. Within about thirty minutes, severe stomach pains and clenching of the abdominal muscles begin. After a while, you may get spasms and severe pain in the arms, legs, and feet. Finally, the … Read more

If it were true that earthworms could grow back if cut in half, then worms could dispense with that messy sex business. Worm sex is messy, although pretty efficient. Worms are hermaphrodites, so they can mate with any other worm of their species (although not, as some would have you believe, with themselves). They do … Read more

It’s a good question. It gets unbelievably cold in the Arctic, —down to an average temperature of 90 degrees below zero, with a windchill factor like you wouldn’t believe. The animals living in the Arctic have developed strategies to help them beat the cold. These include ears and tails that reduce heat loss, lots of … Read more

The penguin dives the deepest underwater of all the birds on earth. This is probably because it’s an excellent swimmer. Some species can dive 900 feet, the height of a typical seventy-five-story building, and hold their breath for nearly twenty minutes while swimming.

Scientists penguins would probably not survive if they were transported from their native environment in the Antarctic to the Arctic. For one thing, they would find none of the landmarks that they used to establish their ancestral breeding grounds. For another, they don’t defend themselves and their young well—, they thrive so well in the … Read more

We know it’s hard to imagine flocks of penguins flying overhead, but millions of years ago penguins did fly. Eventually, though, flying became superfluous to their lives. They didn’t have any land-bound natural enemies that would make fast escape by air necessary, and they spent most of their time in the water. Air wings gave … Read more

Alligators, like many other reptiles, don’t have sex chromosomes. As a result, alligator gender isn’t determined by the interaction of the parents’ genes. Instead, it is completely decided by temperature. When it’s egg-laying time, the female finds a nice large area on the bank of her swamp and digs a large hole, up to six … Read more

The lizards that climb walls and ceilings don’t usually fall off. But it’s not because they have great suction. Actually, they’re not really using suction at all. Here’s how their feet work: On the bottom, there are dozens and dozens of grooves. (You can see them if you look closely at the bottom of a … Read more

A newt is a type of salamander in that it fulfills the basic requirements: its skin is thin, it breathes through gills until its lungs grow, and the adults can leave the water and walk among us as land-dwellers. The biggest difference from other salamanders is that adult newts have flatter tails than most. This … Read more

Frogs don’t have teeth, so blinking when they swallow helps them get their food down. Frogs’ eyes, not unlike those of the hippopotamus, are big, bulgy, and located on the tops of their heads. This helps them to see, even when their bodies are submerged in water. The problem is that it also means these … Read more

Both shark oil and cod-liver oil were once very commonly used as supplements for vitamins A and D. However, in the 1940s scientists figured out how to cheaply manufacture the vitamins, saving generations of kids from spoonfuls of the fishy, slimy swill. These days, the dietary supplement in vogue is fish oils. Omega-3 and Omega-6 … Read more

Here’s why it happens: Most fish keep their equilibrium while in the water with an air bladder that balances out their body mass and makes them essentially weightless, neither sinking nor floating to the surface. This is energy-efficient for them, so they don’t have to continuously flap their fins and tails to stay at a … Read more

A Squid can swim faster than an octopus. Octopi are smooth, gliding along on their tentacles like an eight-legged Fred Astaire, but they’re no match in speed for a squid. Squids can shoot water backward like a rocket engine, pushing them forward in great bursts of speed. Some can glide through the water at about … Read more

Standard procedure is for the octopus to squirt the ink, change its own color as camouflage, and simultaneously jet away under the inky murk’s cover. While the ink does do a good job of this, it also holds a secret weapon that further facilitates an octopus’s escape. The ink, even when diluted in the ocean, … Read more

Oh, an electric eel can produce about 350 to 650 watts of electricity, but you better get a surge protector. An electric eel delivers only three to five bursts of electricity when it discharges, each lasting about one-five hundredth of a second. While its voltage is enough to temporarily stupefy a human being, the eel … Read more

It’s not their blood that makes lobsters turn red when they’re cooked. Lobster blood is colorless unless exposed to oxygen, at which point it develops a bluish tint. The shells of lobsters are mostly gray, green, or brown when they’re alive, but never red. Boiling them breaks down the various pigments that color their shells. … Read more

The record for living out of water by a sea creature is about 10,000 years, set by some brine shrimp. Also known as “sea monkeys” in toy stores, the little crustaceans go into a form of suspended animation when they get caught outside the salt water where they make their home. While they remain in … Read more

Before people discovered the mysteries of blood type, transfusions were a hit-or-miss procedure. Some historians believe that the Incas may have been the first to do successful blood transfusions. If that’s true, what would have made the job easier is that they were all the same blood type (0 positive). The year of Columbus, 1492, … Read more

Mixing incompatible blood quickly creates a sea of red dumplings swimming in yellowish liquid, bringing on instantaneous death. In 1900 Dr. Karl Landsteiner discovered the A, B, and 0 blood groups and demonstrated that blood could be successfully mixed within the same group. He named the differences the “Rh factor.”

RH is short for “rhesus,” in honor of the research monkeys that gave their blood (and sometimes their lives) as Dr. Karl Landsteiner tested out these properties.

The first artificial heart valve was implanted in 1952 and used a tiny plastic ball to alternately open and close the blood flow. One problem was that when patients opened their mouths, clicks from the valve were annoyingly loud. The first artificial heart was made of Dacron and was in a Texas man’s chest in … Read more

One day in 1893, a Chicago man named James Cornish was stabbed in the chest and rushed to Provident Hospital, bleeding to death. Despite the medical profession’s lack of success in fixing damaged hearts, Dr. Daniel Hale Williams rushed Cornish into the operating room and called in a team of surgeons. At the time, attempts … Read more

You don’t want any of them, but if you had to choose which not to get, pick the heart attack. Here are the reasons: An estimated 40 percent of all heart attacks are fatal. A heart attack occurs when blood flow is cut off to and from the heart. Over 220,000 people a year die … Read more

The theory we like best is that it’s your body’s reaction to perceptual dissonance. While riding in a car, you’re in an enclosed area in which your eyes perceive that nothing nearby is moving, but your ears and the rest of your body feel like you indeed are moving. In an effort to solve that … Read more

Traffic these days is not much faster than when there were horses on the street, alas. The average speed of a horse-drawn carriage traveling in a big city a century ago was about eight miles per hour. The average speed of a car driving through New York City today, —accounting for traffic lights, pedestrians, double-parked … Read more

Both Detroit and Cleveland claim to be the home of the first traffic light. We do know that both cities installed traffic lights in 1920, apparently independently of each other, and both inspired by the red, yellow, and green safety-light combo used by railroads. However, London beats them both: In 1868, long before motorcars were … Read more

It’s true that earthquakes can create tsunami waves that often devastate distant coastlines. Strangely, though, they don’t do much damage until they actually approach land. That’s because in the open sea, a tsunami is a lateral wave that travels far beneath the surface of the water. Traveling underwater at great speed, it barely affects the … Read more

Most American cities use the recommendations of The Traffic Engineer’s Handbook, which presumes an average speed of 6 feet per second for Joe Pedestrian. If you would like this expressed as a formula, take the total number of feet across the street and divide by 6. Subtract that figure from the total amount of time … Read more

You’re right, it goes against all common sense. Yet it happens. That’s why, when sailing, it becomes necessary to mentally throw out much of what you know about the wind. Forget paper blowing down the street. Forget leaves blowing across the surface of a pond. Sailboats don’t work that way. If they did, the only … Read more